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Digitized by tine Internet Archive 
in 2010 witin funding from 
The Library of Congress 



http://www.archive.org/details/myempresstwentyt01mouc 



MY EMPRESS 




International Film Service 

The ex-Czarina Alexandra of Russia 



MY EMPRESS 

TWENTY-THREE YEARS OF INTIMATE LIFE 

WITH THE EMPRESS OF ALL THE RUSSIAS 

FROM HER MARRIAGE TO THE DAY OF HER EXILE 



BY 
MADAME MARFA MOUCHANOW 

FIBST MAID IN WAITING 



HEB FOBMER MAJESTY 
TBE CZABmA ALEXAHDBA OF BUBSIA 



WITH 
ILLUSTRATIONS FROM PHOTOGRAPHS 



NEW YORK: JOHN LANE COMPANY 

LONDON: JOHN LANE, THE BODLEY HEAD 

MCMXVIII 




^r^ 



Copyright, 1918, 
By Cuetis Publishing Company 

COPTKIGHT, 1918, 

By John Iane Company 



m I5l9i8 



Press of 

J. J. Little & Ives Co. 

New York 



©G!,A^-94598 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTBB PAGE 

I My Appointment 11 

II The First Months of the Czarina's 

Married Life 20 

III Birth of Grand Duchess Olga . . 33 

IV The Coronation 46 

V Visits Abroad 59 

VI The Grand Duchess Elizabeth . . 72 

VII The Czarina's Family Relations . . 82 

Vin Life at Czarskoi Selo 94 

IX The Court and Attendants of the 

Czarina 105 

X The Czarina and St. Petersburg So- 
ciety 117 

XI The Czarina and Her Mother-in-Law 129 

Xn The Czarina's Daily Occupations . 141 

XIII The Japanese War and the Birth of 

the Czarevitsch 152 

XTV The Czarina, Her Children and Her 

Charities 164 

5 



6 Contents 

CHAPTER PAGE 

XV The First Revolution 176 

XVI The Czarina's Friends 188 

XVII The Great War 200 

XVIII Disasters and the Second Revolu- 
tion 211 

XIX How THE Czarina Was Arrested . . 222 

XX Life IN Prison 236 

XXI Exile — I Am Dismissed 249 



ILLUSTRATIONS 

The ex-Czarina Alexandra of Russia . Frontispiece 

FACING 
PAGE 

The ex-Czar Nicholas II of Russia .... 20 

Winter Palace, Petrograd 34 

Alexander Hall in the Kremlin at Moscow . . 44 

Throne Room in the Kremlin at Moscow . . 52 

Old Banquet Hall of the Czars 70 

Rasputin 80 

The ex-Czarina of Russia and her Four Daughters 102 

Grounds of the Imperial Palace at Tzarskoie Selo 122 

Grand Duke Michael 132 

Grand Duchess Olga 144 

The ex-Czarevitch 156 

The ex-Czarina and her Son 168 

The Grand Staircase, Winter Palace, Petrograd 178 

Grand Duchess Elizabeth 188 

Grand Duchess Anastasia 220 



MY EMPRESS 



/ 



MY EMPRESS 

CHAPTER I 
MY APPOINTMENT 

It is the custom, or rather it was the custom, at 
the Russian Court, not to allow any Princess mar- 
rying into the Imperial family to bring with her 
maids from her own country. I believe that this 
custom was also observed at Foreign Courts, at 
least in former times. Therefore, when it became 
known that the heir to the Russian Throne, as 
Nicholas II. still was when he became the affianced 
husband of the lovely Princess Alix of Hesse, was 
about to bring a bride to his parents' home, specu- 
lations became rife, and much heart burning re- 
sulted among people wlio considered themselves 
entitled to the honour of becoming attendants on 
the future Empress of All the Russias. 

Of coiu'se the choice of the maids destined to 

wait upon her was to a certain measure dependent 

11 



12 My Empress 

on the will of the Reigning Empress, and the lat- 
ter felt that it would not do to surround her daugh- 
ter-in-law with women unable to talk any other 
language than Russian. A list was submitted to 
her of ladies who were supposed to be eligible for 
the position, and, unknown to myself, my name 
was placed upon it. 

The functions of first maid to a Czarina were 
far from being purely honorific. Of course she 
was not supposed to do any menial work, but, on 
the other hand, she had to show herself most dis- 
creet, to avoid gossip of any kind, to have no inti- 
mate friends or relatives in whom she might feel 
tempted to confide, and, moreover, considerable re- 
sponsibility rested on her shoulders, as she had un- 
der her care not only the personal jewels of her 
Imperial mistress, but also those belonging to the 
Crown (when these happened to be used) , the con- 
trol of everything that was connected with the toilet 
and personal axiomment of the Princess in whose 
service she stood, the paying of her private bills, 
and so forth. She had under her eight other 
maids, whose duties consisted in attending to the 
wants of the Princess, but these took no initiative, 
and were entirely dependent upon her, having to 



My Appointment 13 

obey her and to listen to all her instructions. One 
had to have a certain rank or Tschin, as it is called 
in Russian, to be able to obtain such an appoint- 
ment, and probably the fact that my husband, who 
had died a short time before the marriage of Nich- 
olas II. and Alexandra Feodorovna, had been a 
Colonel, had something to do with the fact that 
my name figured on the list of the women consid- 
ered eligible for the position which I was to obtain. 
As is well known, the arrival of the Princess 
Alix in Russia was hurried on account of the iU- 
ness of the Czar Alexander III., who knew him- 
self to be dying, and who wished to see his future 
daughter-in-law before he breathed his last. The 
Grand Duchess Elizabeth of Russia, the wife of 
the Grand Duke Sergius, who was the eldest sister 
of the Princess, went to meet her at Warsaw, and 
brought her to Livadia^ in the Crimea, which she 
reached about three days before the demise of the 
Emperor. She was met on her arrival with all the 
honours pertaining to the bride of the heir ap- 
parent, but the circumstances which accompanied 
her journey were such sad ones, that they could not 
help painfuUy impressing her and adding to the 
natural melancholy of her character, which was al- 



14 My Empress 

ready at that time sufficiently pronounced to cause 
anxiety to the people who surrounded her. 

The mortal remains of Alexander III. were 
brought back with much pomp to St. Petersburg, 
where instead of making the solemn entry which 
Kussian Imperial brides generally do in the cap- 
ital, in golden coaches surrounded with elaborate 
ceremonies, the Princess Alix arrived in a mourn- 
ing carriage, smothered in the folds of her crepe 
veil. No one noticed her, and the general interest 
of the public was concentrated on the Empress 
Dowager, whose grief was pitiable to witness. 
The young girl about to take the latter's place on 
the throne of Russia felt quite lost and lonely 
amidst her new surroundings, and no one seemed 
to care for her, or to trouble as to what was going 
to befall her. At that time many people believed 
that her marriage would be postponed until after 
the mourning for Alexander III. was over, and 
hoped that something might yet occur to prevent 
its ever taking place. The alliance was not popu- 
lar, and neither Court society nor the nation felt 
pleased at the idea of a German Princess coming 
to share the throne of their new Sovereign. He 
was known already to be absolutely lacking in 



My Appointment 15 

character, and many persons feared that through 
the influence which his wife might come to acquire 
over his mind, the Grand Duke Sergius, who was 
married, as I have already related, to the sister of 
the Princess Alix, would become paramount at 
the Russian Court. And the Grand Duke was the 
most hated and tlie most unpopular personage in 
the whole country. 

Family intervention, however, decided other- 
wise, and, partly thanks to the efforts of the Prince 
and Princess of Wales, who had arrived in St. 
Petersburg to be with the Empress Marie in her 
hour of sorrow, it was decided to solemnise the nup- 
tials of the new Czar as quickly as possible; there- 
fore the twenty-sixth of November, 1894, the 
birthday anniversary of the widow of Alexander 
III., was chosen for it. 

All this time I had not seen my new mistress. 
She was supposed to be too busy to have leisure to 
become acquainted with her future household, and 
it was only some three days before the one selected 
for the wedding that I was at last presented to her 
in the Palace of the Grand Duke Sergius, where 
she had resided since her arrival in St. Petersburg. 

My first impression was that of a tall, slight girl. 



i6 My Empress 

with straight long features, a classical profile, and 
a lovely figure, which gave no indications^ of the 
tendency to stoutness that was to spoil it later on. 
She had fair hair that shone like gold in the sun, 
whilst at times it appeared quite dark, according 
to the light which played upon it. The mouth was 
the most defective feature in an otherwise almost 
perfectly beautiful face. It had a determined ex- 
pression, which even then could be unpleasant, and 
the chin was decidedly heavy. But the general im- 
pression she produced was that of a superb woman. 
The deep mourning which she wore suited her, and 
heightened the natural whiteness of her lovely com- 
plexion, and I remember thinking that I had never 
yet seen any one more beautiful than this girl about 
to become my Empress. 

She said very little to me, and what she did say 
was uttered in a low, constrained voice. She 
seemed to have a nervous dread at the idea of being 
compelled to have strangers about her, and she 
asked me to ascertain from the maid from whom 
she was about to part her customs and habits, so as 
to be able to direct the women who were to attend 
on her in the future. But when I asked her to al- 
low me to begin my duties at once, she objected. 



My Appointment 17 

saying that it would be time enough on her wed- 
ding day. 

This proved inconvenient in many respects, be- 
cause it was most difficult to attend to the many de- 
tails connected with a compKcated toilet, such as a 
bridal one invariably is, let alone an Imperial one, 
and to make decisions for an utter stranger. Ac- 
cording to etiquette the Grand Duchess (the Prin- 
cess Alix had been given this title on the day she 
had entered the Greek Church) had to dress in the 
Winter Palace, where not only her eight maids, but 
all the ladies in waiting on the Empress Dowager, 
those of her own future household, and the jewels 
she was to wear, were awaiting her. To a room 
set aside for the purpose by etiquette had been 
brought the gold toilet service of the Empress 
Anne, which is always taken out for such occasions 
and for such only, and it was spread on a table be- 
fore which the Princess was asked to sit. The dia- 
mond Crown used for Imperial weddings was then 
brought to the Empress Dowager, who, according 
to the rules of the ceremony, had to put it on the 
head of the bride. But an unforeseen incident oc- 
curred. The hairdresser, who was to adjust the 
crown and the bridal veil, could not be found; no 



1 8 My Empress 

one knew where he was, nor could any one take his 
place. At last it was discovered that an over- 
zealous police official, believing his ticket of admis- 
sion invalid, had refused to let him enter the Win- 
ter Palace. A whole hour went by before this was 
discovered, and the marriage was delayed for that 
length of time, to the wonder of the thousands of 
people assembled to witness it, in the various rooms 
and halls of the Imperial residence. 

During this weary hour the Princess sat motion- 
less before her looking glass, hardly saying a word, 
but with tears in her eyes which, however, she 
bravely tried to conceal. People buzzed around 
her, trying to attract her attention, but she did not 
seem to heed them, and merely waited and waited, 
with that patience which, as I discovered later on, 
was a distinctive feature in her character. At last 
the hairdresser was brought in, hot and excited, and 
he quickly fastened the diamond diadem on the 
head of the young bride, whom we proceeded to 
array in the long mantle of cloth of gold, lined with 
ermine, which she was to wear over her white gown. 
When she was ready and stood before us, previous 
to the starting of the procession for the chapel, we 
all uttered an exclamation. None among us had 



My Appointment 19 

ever gazed at anything more lovely than she ap- 
peared to our eyes, and indeed I have never, in the 
years that followed, seen Alexandra Feodorovna 
look so splendid as on that grey November morn- 
ing which saw her married to the Czar of All the 
Russias. 



CHAPTER II 

THE FIRST MONTHS OF THE 
CZARINA'S MARRIED LIFE 

Owing to the haste with which the royal wed^ 
ding was celebrated there was no time to prepare 
in advance suitable apartments for the Czar and 
his bride in any of the Imperial palaces either in 
St. Petersburg or in Czarskoi Selo. The latter 
residence had from the very first been spoken of as 
the future abode of the young couple, being a fa- 
vourite one with the new Sovereign. But the 
Alexander Palace, the only one which was more or 
less adapted to the exigencies of modern life, had 
not been inhabited since the death of the Empress 
Marie Alexandrovna, the Consort of Alexander 
II., and required to be entirely overhauled. The 
Winter Palace, too, was in want of renovation, and 
particularly unsuitable, as the young Empress had 
expressed a wish to have the apartments which she 
was to occupy newly furnished, according to her 
own tastes and ideas. The result of this state of 

20 




International Film Service 

The ex-Czar Nicholas II of Russia 



First Months of Married Life 21 

things was that the newly married couple spent the 
first months of their wedded life in the Anitschkoff 
Palace, the residence of the Dowager Empress, in 
the small rooms which had been occupied by Nich- 
olas II. as a bachelor, rooms that were anything 
but comfortable, and where there was not even suf- 
ficient place for the wardrobe of the bride, who, 
besides, found herself without a sitting-room of her 
own, and had to borrow that of her mother-in-law 
whenever she wished to receive any one. 

Of course this was not pleasant for her, and I 
will add that it put her from the very outset in a 
false position which she felt acutely. She was be- 
ing treated like a child, and she would not have 
been human had she been pleased with the situa- 
tion. During the first weeks of her marriage, 
when the whole court was still in deep mourning 
for the late Czar, it did not perhaps matter as 
much as it would have done later on, or under dif- 
ferent circumstances, but still it was disagreeable. 
The Dowager Empress was, in her way, just such 
an authoritative character as was her daughter-in- 
law, therefore the two ladies soon found themselves 
in strong opposition, and, though they did not own 
to it, became heartily tired of each other. Six 



22 My Empress 

weeks after the wedding Alexandra Feodorovna 
persuaded her husband to go for one week to 
Czarskoi Selo, and when she returned to St. 
Petersburg I found that a considerable change had 
taken place in her manners and bearing, much of 
her former diffidence and shyness having disap- 
peared. She began to decide for herself certain 
things she would not have dreamt of doing before 
without having consulted her mother-in-law, and 
she organised her personal existence after her own 
heart. The first changes which she introduced 
concerned her maids' attendance upon her, and she 
called me into her presence one morning to discuss 
them at length, refusing to listen to some observa- 
tions which I thought it my duty to make to her. 
In my opinion it would have been better to have 
waited until we had moved out of the Anitschkoff 
Palace before altering the rules which presided 
over the dressing-room and wardrobe parapher- 
nalia of the young Empress, but my observations 
were not kindly received, and I was told most per- 
emptorily to obey the instructions given to me, 
which of course I did, but not without misgivings 
as to the opportuneness of the changes introduced 
in the routine of my Imperial mistress' existence. 



First Months of Married Life 23 

Amongst others was the disposal of the cast-off 
dresses of the young Empress. These were le- 
gion, as she had been presented with a trousseau 
of unusual abundance. But they were all of them, 
or nearly all, mourning or half -mourning gowns, 
and Alexandra seemed in haste to get rid of them. 
She had her own ideas in the matter of her toilets, 
and generally sketched, herself, the clothes which 
she ordered. She had not good taste, this much 
must be admitted, but she cared for dresses, and 
liked to see hers renewed as often as possible. 
Sometimes she had three or four garments laid out 
and displayed before her eyes before she finally 
made a choice. She had the idea that as a Sover- 
eign she ought to dress with great magnificence 
from the very first hours of the morning, and she 
disdained the simple tailor costumes which, on the 
contrary, were so much liked by her mother-in-law. 
The latter had been the best dressed woman in her 
empire, but she had never fussed about her clothes, 
and had afi*ected a great simplicity in her every day 
attire, reserving for state occasions the many Paris 
creations that were being constantly sent over to 
her. In a small house like the Anitschkofi^ Palace 
the servants knew, of course, everything that was 



24 My Empress 

going on, and much gossip passed between the 
maids of the two Empresses, those of the young 
one complaining to the attendants of the Dowager 
of the fussiness of their mistress in regard to her 
toilet. This gossip reached higher than the house- 
keeper's room, and contributed to the reputation 
for caprice that Alexandra Feodorovna acquired 
almost immediately after her marriage, a reputa- 
tion that was to cling to her and to harm her so 
much in public opinion later on. 

Now I feel persuaded that if the Emperor and 
Empress had had from the very first days of their 
married life a home of their own, this would have 
been avoided, because there would have been no op- 
portunity for gossip between servants. As it was, 
the Dowager once or twice made remarks to her 
daughter-in-law concerning the manner in which 
she worried her attendants by too much fuss about 
her clothes, and these were, of course, very badly 
received. And Alexandra Feodorovna bitterly re- 
sented an allusion that was made to the fact that 
when she was at Darmstadt she would not 
have dared to display such a capricious temper. 
All these things were but trifles, but nevertheless 



First Months of Married Life 25 

they were to exercise considerable influence on the 
afterlife of my mistress. 

The Empress was inordinately fond of beautiful 
furs and used to spend considerable sums in ac- 
quiring continually new and most costly ones. For 
this, too, she was reproached, and told that her 
trousseau had contained sufficient fur garments, so 
that there was no necessity to be always buying new 
ones. She was reported to be extravagant, with rea- 
son perhaps, though there was nothing inordinate 
about her love for pretty things ; certainly the bills 
which she ran at Worth's and Paquin's, and other 
dressmakers of repute, were not half so large as 
those which her mother-in-law had incurred for- 
merly. But then the latter had always been a fa- 
vourite, and St. Petersburg society had smiled on 
everything she had ever done or said. 

One of my duties was to take care of the Em- 
press's jewels. She had received some splendid 
and costly wedding presents from her relatives 
in England and Russia, and especially from the 
Emperor, who, among other things, had presented 
her with an all round crown of pearls and diamonds 
which, together with some wonderful sapphires, he 
had bought in London when he had paid her a visit 



26 My Empress 

there during their betrothal. She loved to wear 
them, and at first had not given a thought to the 
possibility of having to lay them aside for far more 
splendid parures and ornaments. But very soon 
after her marriage there arose a question concerning 
the Crown jewels, which were supposed to be devot- 
ed to the use of the reigning Empress. During the 
reign of Alexander III., the Empress Marie had 
had them in her own keeping, and by his will the 
Emperor had given her the use of them for her life- 
time. Now it seems that he had not the power to 
dispose of them, and very naturally the treasurjr 
claimed them after the demise of the Czar. His 
widow, however, stoutly refused to give them up, 
and painful scenes ensued, which assumed such 
proportions that at last Alexandra Feodorovna de- 
clared that, for her part, she would never consent 
to wear the ornaments in dispute, that her mother- 
in-law was welcome to them, and could keep them 
as long as she liked. This, however, could not 
be done, and at last the jewels were returned 
to the treasury whence they w^ere sometimes 
taken and handed over to me, with great cere- 
mony, for the use of my mistress on state occa- 
sions. But the Empress never liked them, and 



First Months of Married Life 27 

avoided putting them on, preferring her own 
jewels. She declared that the big pearl and dia- 
mond tiara, which, since the days of Catherine II., 
had graced the head of all the Russian Empresses, 
was far too heavy. I do not think I have seen her 
wear more than four or five times the famous neck- 
lace valued at twenty millions of roubles, which, 
on the contrarj^, had been one of the favourite or- 
naments of the Dowager Empress. The last time 
this historical jewel was seen in public was at the 
ball given by the nobility of St. Petersburg on the 
occasion of the three hundredth anniversary of the 
accession of the dynasty of Romanoff to the throne 
of the Ruriks, in February, 1915, which was also 
the last time that the Empress Alexandra ever ap- 
peared at any save a religious festivity. 

Whenever she decided to put on any of those 
Crown jewels I had to send a note announcing her 
intention to the head treasurer in charge of the 
strong room where the diamonds and precious 
stones of the Czar were kept. He then summoned 
an escort of three soldiers out of the guard on duty 
in the Winter Palace, and, surrounded by them, 
brought me the articles I had requested him to de- 
liver. I had to give a receipt for them, and as soon 



28 My Empress 

as the Empress had taken them off I had to advise J 
that same treasurer of the fact, then he immedi- 
ately came with another escort to reclaim them, re- 
turning to me at the same time the receipt I had 
signed a few hours previous. The complications 
associated with this procedure were one of the rea- 
sons that made the Empress averse to using those 
ornaments, about which she did not care. She 
much preferred adding constantly to her private 
jewel boxes, and soon she became possessed of one 
of the most remarkable collections of precious 
stones in Europe. Pearls were her special favour- 
ites, and the Emperor, who was aware of the fact, 
was constantly presenting her with additions to her 
various necklaces, and other pearl ornaments, and 
the two Court jewellers, Bolin and Faberge, had a 
standing order to bring to Czarskoi Selo every 
fine specimen they could get hold of, before show- 
ing it to any one else among their customers. 

This passion of the Empress for constantly ac- 
quiring new ornaments was also a cause of bitter 
reproach, and one of her aunts, the Grand Duchess 
Marie Pavlovna, who was anything but kind and 
charitable, once characterised it as ''un gout de par- 
venue/* 



First Months of Married Life 29 

In those early days of her married life there 
arose another cause of friction between the Em- 
press and her mother-in-law. It was connected 
with the manner of praying in church for the two 
ladies. The Dowager insisted that her name ought 
to come first, immediately after that of her son, the 
Sovereign. But the ministers, and even the Holy 
Synod, objected and declared that, according to 
custom, the mother ought to rank after the wife. 
Finally it was the opinion of the Synod that pre- 
vailed. But Alexandra Feodorovna, who had in- 
terested herself deeply in the matter, was not wise 
enough to hide her joy at the turn things had taken, 
and this of course contributed to the strained rela- 
tions that soon established themselves between her 
and the widow of Alexander III. 

'No harmony reigned at the Anitschkoif Palace 
during those early days of my mistress' married 
life, and it is no wonder that the latter became more 
and more embittered as time went on. She felt 
herself neglected, and did nothing to please those 
whom she suspected of wilfully slighting her. She 
had a morbid desire to please, combined with a nat- 
ural haughtiness, which made her not only sensible 
to a rebuff, but also desirous of avenging it. She 



30 My Empress 

did not care to be brushed aside by her relatives, 
and yet she was herself contributing to the cause of 
their actions, by her aloofness from all those who 
might have been of use to her. She did not under- 
stand St. Petersburg society; she considered it im- 
moral and fast, and she made no secret of the fact, 
snubbing unnecessarily people strong enough to do 
her serious harm by their judgments and apprecia- 
tions of her conduct and personality. The misun- 
derstandings which caused her future unpopularity 
began from the very first hours of her arrival in 
Russia. 

With her attendants, however, she was always 
kind and gracious, though distant in her manner. 
It was only after many years that she grew to have 
confidence in me, but then it was a complete one, 
and sometimes she would allow herself to give way 
in my presence to fits of despondency such as over- 
took her from time to time, during which I feel 
perfectly convinced she was not entirely responsi- 
ble for her actions. Her mind, always prone to 
melancholy, made her look at things on their black- 
est side, and this partly accounts for the tendency 
towards mysticism which she was to develop later 
on, and which contributed, more than anything else, 



First Months of Married Life 31 

to the catastrophe that was to send her an exile to 
the solitudes of Siberia. She was never well bal- 
anced, and, when judging her, one must not forget 
that insanit}^ was hereditaiy in the House of Hesse, 
a fact of which many people in Russia were aware, 
but of which it seems that the Imperial family were 
left in ignorance. Sensitive to a degree, she could 
not get rid of prejudices which she was inclined to 
adopt without any reason other than caprice, and 
prejudices are among the things which sovereigns 
ought never to entertain in regard to those whom 
they may happen to meet, or with whom they are 
surrounded. But with it all she was sweet and 
gentle, and good, and conscientious; a perfect 
mother, a most devoted wife, a staunch friend, in- 
capable of meanness or of treachery, but destined 
by her very qualities to be always misunderstood, 
and never appreciated as she ought to have been. 
Amidst the pomp and splendour that surrounded 
her she was lonely; she felt isolated, and though 
she had found on her arrival in her new country 
hosts of relatives and courtiers, she had not met one 
single disinterested friend whom she could trust, 
or towards whom she could turn for advice and 
protection. The grandeur of her position put her, 



32 My Empress 

as it were, outside of the world, and, unfortunately, 
she was so overpowered by this grandeur that she 
did not even attempt to break through the bar- 
riers it had erected around her, and which divided 
her from the rest of mankind. 



CHAPTER III 

BIRTH OF GRAND DUCHESS OLGA 

The uncomfortable winter which followed upon 
the marriage of the Czar came at last to an end 
without his young bride having been much seen in 
public. The ladies prominent in St. Petersburg 
society were presented to her during a great recep- 
tion which she held in the Winter Palace, but this 
presentation consisted simply in their passing be- 
fore her with a curtsey, whilst her Mistress of the 
Robes, the Princess Galitzyne, whispered their 
names into her ear. She spoke to no one, and of 
course no one spoke to her, and for the influence 
that this reception had upon her relations with that 
society over which she had to preside, it might just 
as well never have taken place. There were, it is 
true, a few old ladies whose husbands either had 
been, or still were, in high official positions, who 
were received by the Empress in private audience, 
but these interviews were generally of short dura- 
tion, and consisted in the exchange of a few banali- 

33 



34 My Empress 

ties in the way of conversation. The Empress did 
not speak French well, and English at that time 
was not the fashionable language of the upper 
class, as is the case at present. Ill-natured people 
commented on the mistakes made by the young 
Sovereign in her use of the French idiom, and ridi- 
culed them. She became aware of the fact, and it 
hurt her deeply, and added to the natural diffi- 
dence of her character. In those early days of her 
married life, Alexandra Feodorovna was striving 
still for popularity, but doing it in a clumsy, mis- 
taken manner. She felt afraid of being called pro- 
German, and exaggerated in consequence her mani- 
festations of amiability in regard to everybody and 
everything that was connected with France, to 
such an extent that she was accused of want of 
frankness, not to use a more emphatic word. It 
was the same thing with her sympathies for the 
autocratic regime. At the time of her marriage, 
people hoped that her influence over her husband 
would result in his granting to Russia that consti- 
tution which everybody had been sighing for, for 
years. But the Imperial family, from the very 
first hour of her arrival in the country, had repeated 
to her that it was her duty to uphold the principles 



Birth of Grand Duchess Olga 35 

of that autocracy which Alexander III. had so suc- 
cessfully maintained during the whole time of his 
reign. She accepted this bad advice, and, in her 
dread of being thought adverse to it, she applied 
herself to persuade the Czar that he ought to make 
some public declaration of his intentions to gov- 
ern according to the principles that had inspired his 
deceased father. She partly succeeded, but the at- 
tempt was not a happy one, because the famous 
speech of Nicholas II. to the zemstvos, where he 
affirmed his resolve to govern despotically, and 
characterised as senseless dreams the aspirations 
of his people, contributed more than anything else 
to make him, together with his consort, the most 
hated and unpopular Sovereign Russia had ever 
known. 

The first winter which saw the Princess Alix 
transformed into the Empress of All the Russias 
was, therefore, not precisely what can be called a 
happy one. In summer the Court went as usual 
to Peterhof, and the alterations which by this time 
had begun to be made in the Czarskoi Selo Palace 
were hastened, because the first accouchement of 
the young Empress was expected in November, 
and it had been decided that the expected family 



36 My Empress 

event, so anxiously looked forward to, should take 
place there. 

Alexander Feodorovna herself superintended 
these alterations. Under her care the old build- 
ing which had been the favourite residence of Al- 
exander II. and of his consort, that other Hessian 
Princess who, however, had been both liked and re- 
spected by her subjects, was completely trans- 
formed. Splendour was banished from it, but the 
whole place was furnished and arranged in the 
style of an English cottage, with chintz hangings, 
plenty of flowers of which the Empress was inor- 
dinately fond, and a lot of nick-nacks and photo- 
graphs that gave it quite a homelike look. Alex- 
andra had admirable taste in all that concerned the 
inner arrangements of her apartments, and she 
transformed the old residence of the Russian Czars 
into a lovely country house, such as one finds in old 
England or in France. But her ideas in regard to 
furniture and curtains and general interior orna- 
mentation of the rooms destined for her private use 
differed so entirely from the accepted Russian no- 
tions on the subject that they came to be discussed, 
not only ill-naturedly, but also disagreeably. She 
had consulted no one, and had made no secret of 



Birth of Grand Duchess Olga 37 

her disapproval of certain things that had been 
done without her consent, speaking about them with 
an acrimony she would have done better, for her 
future peace, to have avoided. 

The Emperor, however, was charmed with all 
that she had done, and delighted at the way in 
which she had arranged their new residence, to 
which they moved early in the month of October, 
1895. The Empress at once organised her exist- 
ence upon lines to which she remained more or less 
faithful all through her reign. She used to rise 
early, and never failed to breakfast with the Em- 
peror and to accompany him in the walk which he 
liked to take every morning before settling down 
to the business of the day. They used to go, in all 
kinds of weather, for long rambles in the park 
which surrounded the Palace of Czarskoi Selo, Al- 
exandra Feodorovna dressed in a short sable jacket 
and a velvet skirt, which she changed for a more 
elaborate garment when she returned home. She 
disliked dressing gowns, and the first one I ever 
saw her wear was during an illness which attacked 
the Grand Duchess Olga, in the latter's early child- 
hood, when her mother sat up with her at night. 



38 My Empress 

and was persuaded to exchange her tight garments 
for more comfortable ones. 

At eleven o'colck, the Empress' private secre- 
tary made his appearance, and brought to her the 
numerous correspondence that had to be handled. 
They worked together for an hour or so, and Alex- 
andra more than once tried to interest herself in 
public charities and to gather knowledge in regard 
to the various educational establishments in the 
Empire. These, however, were under the special 
patronage of the Empress Dowager, who did not 
brook any interference in the matter, and who ap- 
plied herself to keep her daughter-in-law quite out- 
side of it. This was a great misfortune because it 
deprived the latter of considerable interest in her 
existence, and almost compelled her to spend her 
time in frivolous occupations for which she did not 
care. Lunch was served at two o'clock, and was 
generally a simple meal, though an abundant one, 
to which guests were seldom invited. After it was 
over the Emperor remained for an hour with his 
wife, chatting about the various news of the day, 
and then they both went out for another walk. Tea 
was brought to the Empress at five o'clock on a 
tray in her own room, and she generally swallowed 



Birth of Grand Duchess Olga 39 

it in a gulp, without even looking at the cup in 
which it was contained. She was fond of needle- 
work, and amused herself by making lovely little 
lace garments for her expected baby. She did not 
care for the society of her ladies in waiting, whom 
sometimes she did not see for weeks at a time, dur- 
ing those early days of her marriage. Later on, 
however, on account of the reproaches that were 
showered upon her for this neglect of her personal 
attendants, she had them dine with her and the Em- 
peror on Sundays, and this custom lasted until the 
Revolution, when it fell into disuse, together with 
so many other things. 

After dinner the Empress used to ensconce her- 
self in a large armchair by the open fire, and again 
take up her needlework, whilst the Emperor read 
aloud to her. He was very fond of reading, and 
read extremely well. He liked historical books 
better than any others, and followed with consider- 
able interest the different English and French re- 
views which were regularly sent to him. This 
lasted until eleven o'clock or thereabouts, when 
[Nicholas II. repaired to his study for a couple of 
hours' work, whilst the Empress began to undress. 
I was generally present at this operation. 



40 My Empress 

which was performed by the two maids on duty, 
who were changed every day. Alexandra had a 
profusion of beautiful, silky hair, and though she 
was not so capricious about its treatment as the 
poor Empress Elizabeth of Austria, yet she liked 
to have it brushed for half an hour or so, after 
which it was tightly plaited, and bound with silk 
ribbon matching the one which trimmed her night- 
gowns. These were of the finest linen or batiste, 
profusely ornamented with Valenciennes or Mech- 
lin lace. The dressing jackets and peignoirs of 
the Empress were generally made out of muslin 
over silk, with insertions of Brussels net. She was 
excessively fond of beautiful lingerie, and owned 
to me one day that one of her greatest pleasures 
after her marriage had been the possibility of be- 
ing at last able to indulge in her weakness for it. 
Her bed sheets were absolutely magnificent, and 
changed every day, the lace which trimmed them 
being carefully selected to match that on her night 
dresses. Madame Barrauld, the great French 
lingere, who had made the trousseaux of all the 
smart young girls of St. Petersburg society, was 
summoned about once a week to Czarskoi Selo, to 
receive the orders of the Empress in regard to her 



Birth of Grand Duchess Olga 41 

lingerie, and that of her daughters when these were 
born. 

In regard to dresses, Alexandra Feodorovna had 
about fifty for each season, without counting the ex- 
tras. She was very fond of white gowns, notwith- 
standing the fact that these did not suit her. But 
she had been told that it was a Russian custom to 
wear white garments for every great festival, and 
she had exaggerated it to such an extent that St. 
Petersburg society, always on the alert to criticise 
its new Sovereign, had made fun of it, and its smart 
leaders of fashion had affected to put on coloured, 
and even dark dresses, on occasions when previ- 
ously they would never have thought of so doing. 
She was supposed to have no taste in her manner 
of attiring herself, and consequently it was con- 
sidered the thing to do exactly the contrary of what 
she was doing, in that matter at least. 

The Imperial family did not often come to 
Czarskol Selo. At first, the Grand Duchesses, 
aunts of the Empress, had attempted to see her, 
without being summoned to her presence ; but they 
had soon found out that between them and her 
there existed a barrier which it was out of their 
power to remove. Alexandra Feodorovna was al- 



42 My Empress 

ways civil to them, always received them with a 
smile, but she nevertheless contrived to make them 
feel that they bored her, and that she did not care 
for their visits. The Empress Dowager also had 
tried to break through her daughter-in-law's re- 
serve, but though the latter had avoided hurting her 
by showing too openly her dislike to having her 
solitude intruded upon, yet her stiffness had not 
encouraged Marie Feodorovna to repeat the at- 
tempt of considering her son's home as her own, 
and of coming and going in and out of it at her will 
and pleasure. 

All this caused the conduct of the young wife of 
Nicholas II. to be severely criticised from almost 
the first days of her arrival in Russia. Unfortu- 
nately for her the choice that had been made of the 
members of her household had not been a happy 
one. Her Mistress of the Robes, the Princess 
Galitzyne, was an intriguing woman, who thought 
only of her own advantages and the possibility of 
turning to her use and benefit the high position in 
which she found herself placed. Her maids of hon- 
our were very nice girls, but mostly nonentities, 
and, if the truth need be told, her husband was not 
the man capable of being for her the guide she re- 



Birth of Grand Duchess Olga 43 

quired during those first days of her married life. 
The only person whom she saw intimately, and who 
came in time to acquire a considerable influence 
over her, was her sister, the Grand Duchess Eliza- 
beth, of whom she had stood more or less in awe 
during her girlish days, and who abused the priv- 
ileges due to her as the Empress' senior. And the 
Grand Duchess was not a wise mentor for the im- 
pressionable, impulsive woman who had been 
raised by destiny to the throne of All the Russias. 
With her servants Alexandra Feodorovna never 
spoke, except in reference to questions concerning 
their duties. She used to have half an hour's con- 
versation with me in the morning and evening, in 
regard to matters concerning her dresses or jewels, 
and gave me her instructions as to what she re- 
quired to be done in regard to them. But it was 
only after a number of years, and after I had 
helped her nurse the young Princesses during an 
attack of scarlet fever, that the Empress began to 
talk with me of domestic matters, and of different 
other things which worried her. She hated famil- 
iarity, and firmly believed that it was part of her 
duties to keep people at a distance. And yet what 
a kind heart she had! It was sufiicient for her to 



44 My Empress 

know that any misfortune had befallen one of her 
attendants or servants, to show them all the sym- 
pathy with which her soul was full. But in nor- 
mal times she maintained an attitude of reserve 
that was always misunderstood, and for which she 
was more than once bitterly reproached. 

During that month of November which saw the 
first anniversary of the Czar's marriage the Court 
was expecting the birth of the first child of the Im- 
perial pair. All had made up their minds that it 
was going to be a son, an heir to the vast estates 
and to the throne of the Romanoffs. The thought 
that it might be a girl had never crossed the mind 
either of the nation or of the sovereigns themselves. 
Preparations without number had been made for 
the arrival into the world of that much-longed-for 
boy, and for some days no one had slept in the 
Palace of Czarskoi Selo. At last the doctors, who 
for weeks had not left the Imperial residence, 
were summoned to the bedside of Alexandra Feo- 
dorovna. The poor woman had a very hard time, 
and for long hours her life trembled in the balance, 
whilst every hope of seeing the child born alive 
had almost disappeared. Great was the joy, there- 
forCj, when its cry was heard for the first time, a joy, 



Birth of Grand Duchess Olga 45 

however, that was turned into an intense disap- 
pointment when it was announced that the baby 
was nothing but a poor little girl, tiny and delicate; 
a little girl whom no one wanted, and whom no one 
was prepared to like, except the mother, who took 
it to her heart with all the tenderness which, though 
restrained, formed one of the bases of her strange, 
perhaps not lovable, but altogether admirable char- 
acter. 



CHAPTER IV 

THE CORONATION 

The christening of the Grand Duchess Olga 
Nicolaievna was solemnised with great pomp at 
Czarskoi Selo, after which the Court moved to St. 
Petersburg, and the young Empress took posses- 
sion of her new apartments in the Winter Palace. 
These had been gorgeously fitted up with magnifi- 
cent silk hangings manufactured in Lyons, and 
copied from those which adorn the rooms occupied 
by Marie Antoinette in the Royal Palace of Fon- 
tainebleau in France. This had been a surprise of 
the Czar to his wife, but the latter, instead of being 
pleased, was superstitiously affected by this re- 
membrance of the unfortunate Queen of France. 
It has never yet been told that when the Empress 
was quite a child in London an old gipsy woman 
whom she had met when walking with her sisters in 
Richmond Park, had prophesied misfortune to her 
and to her sister Elizabeth, saying that they would 
both marry in a distant country, where nothing but 

46 



The Coronation 47 

tears and sorrow awaited them. This fact, which 
she had never forgotten, had more to do than one 
imagined with that weight of sadness which seemed 
to be always pressing on Alexandra Feodorovna, 
though of course she avoided mentioning it. 

Nevertheless she tried to shake off the premoni- 
tions with which her soul became filled, when she 
saw the rooms which had been prepared for her, 
and she applied herself to give them that touch of 
intimacy which she invariably communicated to all 
the places where she lived. Big palms were 
brought in, and put in different corners, and a few 
valuable pictures were hung on the walls. But the 
Empress did not care for paintings, and when she 
was asked whether she would not have a few of 
those in the Ermitage collection brought to her, as 
was done in the case of her husband's grandmother, 
the Empress Marie Alexandrovna, she refused, 
saying that she did not care to deprive the public 
of the sight of them. In general, art did not ap- 
peal to her, but she read a good deal, and played on 
the piano with considerable pleasure, without, how- 
ever, having the talent for music which distin- 
guished her eldest daughter, the Grand Duchess 
Olga, who became quite an artist later on. It was 



48 My Empress 

the Empress' custom before she began to play to 
take off her rings, of which she possessed some 
beautiful specimens, and to throw them on the piece 
of furniture nearest at hand, forgetting after- 
wards where she had put them. This sometimes 
caused considerable annoyance, as they could not 
always be found irmnediately, and a frantic search 
was made all over the Palace, until at last they 
turned up in some impossible place or other. 
Among these rings was one containing a beautiful 
pink diamond, the Empress' engagement ring, 
which she preferred to all others, and which she 
constantly wore. Nevertheless she could not, even 
in the case of this favourite jewel, divest herself of 
the curious habit of taking it off her finger now 
and then, and playing with it, as a child might have 
done, sometimes quite unconscious that she was 
so doing. 

The Empress' piano was a splendid instrument 
by Erard, and had been a wedding present from 
her mother-in-law. She preferred it to all the 
others that she possessed, and when the Court set- 
tled at Czarskoi Selo definitely, not returning to 
the Winter Palace more than for a few hours, she 
had it removed there, and played on it up to the 



The Coronation 49 

time she was sent into that Siberian exile whence 
perhaps she will never return. 

The baptism of the Grand Duchess Olga was 
the signal for Court fes'tivities to be resumed after 
the period of mourning for Alexander III. was 
over. Balls were again given in the Winter Pal- 
ace, though its young mistress did not much care 
for dancing, but they were of shorter duration, and 
not half so Hvely as those of past times. For one 
thing the Empress was herself nursing her little 
daughter, much to the indignation of her relatives, 
who considered that it was not a befitting thing to 
do in her position, and she liked to retire early. At 
all these receptions she was lovely in appearance, 
and was gorgeously dressed, perhaps too gorgeous- 
ly, and she certainly made a splendid apparition 
when she entered a ballroom. But people thought 
her dull, and found her devoid of that kind of con- 
versation which goes by the name of "small talk." 
She was far too frank to hide her feelings, and 
could not bring herself to show herself amused 
whilst in reality she felt bored. This was noticed, 
and of course resented. People expect one to be 
interested in their doings and sayings, and an Em- 
press who hardly ever smiled did not tally with 



50 My Empress 

their estimate of what she ought to have been, so 
that with one thing and another, the winter season, 
generally so brilliant in St. Petersburg, and to 
which one had looked forward eagerly after the 
sad one which had preceded it, did not prove the 
success that was expected. Alexandra Feodor- 
ovna was fast becoming unpopular, simply because 
she would not lower herself to the level of those 
who criticised her so openly and so persistently. 

Already in those early days there existed a party 
against her, which never missed an opportunity to 
compare her with her mother-in-law, and this not 
to her advantage. The Dowager had been im- 
mensely liked, partly because she had always made 
it a point to appear to like every one she knew or 
met. She had not perhaps been more talkative 
than her daughter-in-law, but she had smiled sweet- 
ly and nodded kindly to all her acquaintances, and 
she had never noticed the shortcomings of her 
neighbour. Alexandra Feodorovna, on the con- 
trary, was inclined to be satirical, and had a keen 
sense of humour, that was not destined to add to the 
pleasures of her existence. She drew most clever 
caricatures, and was fond of showing them. One 
day she produced a wonderfully clever sketch of 



The Coronation 51 

the Czar, sitting in a baby chair, whilst his mother 
was scolding him for refusing to take a plate of 
soup she was handing to him. The drawing passed 
from hand to hand, and did not contribute towards 
establishing harmonious relations between the two 
Empresses, whilst the public was scandalised to see 
the Czar made fun of by his own wife, who ought 
to have been the first person to show him respect 
and deference. All these were but small things, 
but they constituted the drop of water which ends 
by wearing away the hardest rock. Many times I 
wished to warn my mistress of the criticisms to 
which she willingly lent herself by her manners and 
conduct, but I never dared; and those who could 
have done so, like her Mistress of the Robes and 
her ladies in waiting, did not sufficiently consider 
her interests to bring to her observation these small 
matters, which in reality were important ones, in 
regard to her future comfort and happiness. 

What with one thing and another, the unpopu- 
larity of the young Sovereign was already an es- 
tablished fact when the Coronation took place at 
Moscow. It appeared quite plainly on the day 
she made her public entry into the ancient city, 
when the crowds greeted her with absolute silence, 



52 My Empress 

whilst they vociferously cheered the Dowager Em- 
press. Alexandra felt this deeply, and when she 
was alone in her rooms she wept profusely over this 
manifestation of the displeasure of the nation in 
regard to her person. It was the first time that I 
had seen her giving way to grief of any kind, and it 
affected me very much, especially in view of what 
was to follow. I had already learnt to love this 
sweet, gentle lady, who seemed to be pursued with 
such persistent bad luck, and whose actions were 
misunderstood by the very people who ought to 
have appreciated the real motives which guided her. 
The Empress had a high sense of duty, but a mis- 
taken idea of what it consisted. She was far too 
desirous of winning the approval of her subjects 
to set herself to do it in the right way, and besides; 
she had no one to point out to her the various idio- 
syncrasies of the Russian nation and of Russian 
society. She did not wish to go against what she 
considered to be the national feelings of the people 
over whom she reigned, and yet sihe contrived to 
wound these feelings at almost every step she took. 
A terrible example of this occurred during this 
same Coronation I am talking about. Every one 
knows the sad accident which was to mar it, and 




Paid Thompson 



Throne Room in the Kremlin at Moscow 



i 



The Coronation 53 

which offered an analogy with the one that oc- 
euiTed in Paris during the wedding festivities of 
Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette. Thanks to 
the negligence and carelessness of those who ought 
to have known better, a popular festival which was 
one of the distinctive features of the whole pageant 
of the Coronation, ended in dire disaster, and some- 
thing like twenty thousand people were crushed to 
death on the Khodinka Field near Moscow. That 
same night a ball was to take placfe at the French 
Embassy. The Ambassador, the Count de Monte- 
bello, sent one of his attaches to the Master of the 
Ceremonies, asking whether he was to postpone it 
in view of the catastrophe which had taken place in 
the morning. This official who, with others, had 
applied himself to keep the Czar in ignorance of 
the magnitude of the disaster, took it upon him- 
self to reply that there was no reason for this 
change in the programme, and the Court accord- 
ingly repaired to the French Embassy. The 
young Empress, who had heard from one of her 
ladies the truth as to what had taken place, was 
most unhappy at the necessity of appearing in pub- 
lic on the day when such a terrible calamity had 
overtaken so many people, but she felt afraid to 



54 My Empress 

say what she thought, out of dread that one might 
think she had seized hold of the first pretext she 
could find in order to avoid showing herself at the 
Montebellos. It was already at that time suspect- 
ed that her sympathies were with the Germans, and 
she was quite aware of the opinion concerning them 
and herself. She did not wish to give any further 
ground for this belief and thus did not follow the 
instincts of her heart, which would have carried her 
to the different hospitals where the victims of the 
morning had been taken. So with sorrow in her 
soul, and anxiety in her mind, she went to that fatal 
ball and danced the whole night, though her 
thoughts were absent from the gay scene of which 
she was such an unwilling participator. 

On her return to the Kremlin she dropped into 
an easy-chair beside her bed and burst into loud 
sobs, not heeding my presence or that of her other 
maids. Not caring for them to witness this ex- 
plosion of sorrow, I sent them away, and tried to 
comfort my mistress to the best of my ability, en- 
treating her to control herself, and not to distress 
the Emperor with the sight of her grief. But Al- 
exandra Feodorovna kept weeping until at last I 
induced her to repair to the nursery, where the sight 



The Coronation 55 

of her little girl sleeping in her cot brought back her 
composure. 

And this was the woman who was represented to 
be cold and unfeeling, and who was reproached for 
her utter indifference in presence of a catastrophe 
of unusual magnitude! Had she but listened to 
the cry of her own heart, and not always lived in 
dread of making mistakes and of going against the 
sympathies of her surroundings', she would cer- 
tainly have fared much better, and most probably 
would have been far more liked. 

The Coronation was far from the success that 
had been expected, and the Court returned to Pe- 
terhof with a feeling of relief that it was over. A 
few quiet weeks followed, perhaps the happiest in 
the whole life of Alexandra Feodorovna, who 
started then to organise what afterwards turned 
out to be quite an institution — sewing classes at 
which she presided, where ladies of society made 
garments for the poor which were distributed to 
the latter at Christmas, something like Queen 
Mary of England's Needlework Guild. This was 
her first venture in the charitable line, and for 
some time it proved a successful one, because many 
ladies entered into the spirit of it, unfortunately 



56 My Empress 

out of interested motives, and because they ex- 
pected that it would bring them to the Sovereign's 
notice and thus contribute to the success of their 
worldly career. But here again the Empress did 
not realise what lay at the bottom of the willing- 
ness with which her appeal was responded to, and 
she did not show any special favour to the women 
who had entered into its spirit. These were very 
soon disgusted at what they called Imperial in- 
gratitude, and at last the sewing classes of Czar- 
skoi Selo came to an end, at least so far as the 
fashionable world was concerned, because they con- 
tinued to be frequented by the wives and daugh- 
ters of the small tradesmen of the Imperial bor- 
ough, eager to be brought into personal contact 
with their Czar's wife, and with this new ele- 
ment they prospered and contrived to do a great 
deal of good. Later on, during the Japanese war, 
they were transported to the Winter Palace in St. 
Petersburg, where they remained installed until 
the Revolution, the present war having given them 
a new stimulant. 

It was during the weeks which immediately fol- 
lowed upon the Coronation that the plans for a 
series of visits abroad to the different capitals of 



The Coronation 57 

Europe were at last settled. It was also then that 
it was finally decided these visits should include 
one to the President of the French Republic, an 
event which, as can be imagined, gave rise to many 
an animated discussion, and which caused much ink 
to be spilt in the chanceries and newspaper offices 
of the whole world, particularly of Europe. The 
Empress looked forward with apprehension to 
this journey, but nevertheless prepared herself for 
it with unusual care. I had never before seen her 
so interested in regard to the clothes she was to 
wear, and she sent minute directions to Worth of 
rue de la Paix fame, who was to be entrusted with 
the task of making the gowns required for this mo- 
mentous occasion. Much against her will, how- 
ever, it was decided that some of the Crown jewels 
were to be taken along, as it was deemed necessary 
to display unusual splendour during this trip. 
This did not please the Empress, in view of the dis- 
putes which had arisen between her and her mother- 
in-law in regard to these same jewels, but she was 
not allowed to interfere, and both the historic neck- 
lace and the tiara of Catherine II. were duly packed 
and taken. Events proved that the instinct of 
Alexandra Feodorovna had been a true one, be- 



58 My Empress 

cause St. Petersburg society bitterly reproached 
her for this infraction of the old Romanoff tra- 
ditions, which required that the Crown diamonds 
should not be taken out of Russia, and even the 
Imperial family criticised this innovation in an- 
cient customs, and made her responsible for it. In 
reality it was the then Foreign Minister, Prince 
Lobanoff, who had insisted on the Empress ap- 
pearing in London, Paris and Vienna, in the full 
pomp of her Imperial position, and who had raised 
this question with which Alexandra Feodorovna 
herself had had nothing to do, beyond submitting 
to the arrangements which others had made ori 
her behalf. It is thus that history is written. 



CHAPTER V 

VISITS ABROAD 

The beginning of the visits of the young Em- 
peror and Empress to foreign courts was marked 
by one of those misfortunes which seemed to dog 
their footsteps wherever they went. The Minister 
for Foreign Affairs, Prince Lobanoff, died sud- 
denly at a railway station where the Imperial train 
had stopped for a few minutes. He was a man of 
great ability and wide diplomatic experience, and, 
moreover, was a staunch friend of the young Em- 
press, who mourned him with all her heart. He 
would undoubtedly have given her good advice 
later on, which she often needed, and might have 
put her on her guard against the insidious counsel 
which' she so often received from people interested 
in seeing her commit blunder after blunder. His 
successor, Count Mouravieff, was a protege as 
well as a favourite of the Empress's mother, who 
was responsible for his appointment. He was also 
a man of unusual ability, but one who knew very 

59 



6o My Empress 

well on which side his bread was buttered, and who 
was far too worldly wise to attach himself to a 
woman who, he knew but too well, would never 
succeed in making herself popular in the country 
on whose throne she sat. 

One of the first visits paid by Nicholas II. and 
his Consort abroad was to the German Emperor 
and Empress in the town of Breslau, which had 
been chosen in order to give a more intimate look 
to the interview, and to divest it from the more of- 
ficial character it would have had, had it taken place 
in Berlin. They were received with great pomp. 
William II. assumed his best manners and tried 
by all means in his power to make his guests feel 
comfortable. He was the first cousin of Alexandra 
Feodorovna and at one time had imagined that he 
would find in her a staunch ally in his various 
schemes. But during those first months of her mar- 
ried life the Czarina had learnt another lesson, and 
that was that she had better avoid meddling with 
politics. She therefore confined herself to the 
exchange of banalities with her German cou- 
sins, so that the Empress Augusta Victoria after- 
wards remarked that she had never expected to find 
"Alix" so very frivolous. The fact is that the young 



Visits Abroad 6i 

Czarina had taken great care to be splendidly 
dressed for the occasion. Worth had sent a special 
messenger to St. Petersburg to confer with her as 
to the clothes she would require for this great event : 
her first appearance as the Empress of All the 
Russias at Foreign Courts. For the great State 
dinner which took place in Breslau my mistress 
wore a gown the tissue of which had been specially 
woven in Lyons for her, a lustrous white satin bro- 
caded with golden lilies and feathers, the low bodice 
profusely trimmed with gold lace. In her hair 
was a diadem of sapphires and brilliants, and on 
her neck reposed priceless sapphires and pearls, 
the longest row of which fell down to the bottom of 
her skirt. She looked truly magnificent, but this 
splendour was bitterly criticised by the German 
people, who declared she wanted to impress them 
with her riches. Another thing which also dis- 
pleased her hosts was the fact that she had brought 
her gold toilet service, and caused to be put aside 
the silver one that had been prepared for her, which 
out of compliment for her had been specially 
brought from the Royal Treasury in Berlin. This 
silver toilet set had belonged to the famous Queen 
Louise, the mother of William I., and the Kaiser 



62 My Empress 

had imagined that hy allowing it to be used by his 
Russian guest he was paying her a great compli- 
ment. When he heard it had been discarded by 
her he was mortally offended, and even made a 
cutting remark to that effect, which in her turn she 
bitterly resented, saying that it seemed to her that 
her cousin William still thought her the little Hes- 
sian Princess of as little importance as she had been 
before her marriage. All these things might have 
been avoided with a little tact, and often did I de- 
plore this habit the Czarina had, of impulsively say- 
ing things that hurt. I had tried to dissuade her 
from dragging along with her this heavy toilet set, 
which, in fact, got her into trouble wherever she 
went, but she would not listen, and told me that it 
did not concern me what she had decided, and that 
I had only to execute the commands given to me, so 
perforce I had to remain silent. Another whim of 
the Empress was to carry with her the beautiful 
lace trimmings of her dressing table. Wherever we 
went they had to be taken out and adjusted to the 
table before which she sat to have her hair dressed, 
and sometimes this caused unnecessary work which 
exasperated her maids, because all tables were not 
of the same size, and the lace had to be adjusted un- 



Visits Abroad . 63 

der difficulties, as of course it could not be cut. It 
was point d'Angleterre and Brussels lace, and one 
of the sets was composed of old Argenton, valued 
at twenty thousand francs. The set had to be 
changed every day, and was further ornamented 
with satin ribbons of different colours, that added 
to its impression of richness. 

Strange to say, the Czarina enjoyed far more her 
visit to the Vienna Court than the one she had paid 
to her Berlin cousins. She had always felt curious 
to know the Empress Elizabeth, and the fact that 
the latter had consented to come out of her retire- 
ment, and to be present at her reception in Vienna, 
could not but flatter her. Moreover, she felt at- 
tracted by the personality of the beautiful Bavarian 
Princess, whom a sad fate had transformed into a 
Mater Dolorosa, and the two ladies were from the 
first sympathetic to each other. By a delicate at- 
tention, which I fear no one appreciated, the Czar- 
ina had selected a white dress for the State dinner 
which was given in the Hofburg, and during the 
whole time she stayed in Vienna, she made it a point 
not to appear in colours, out of respect for the feel- 
ings of the Empress Elizabeth, who never, as long 



64 My Empress 

as she lived, left off her mourning for the Archduke 
Rudolph. 

We also, during this tour, went to Balmoral, 
where the Empress met her grandmother, Queen 
Victoria. The old Sovereign had been very kind 
to this grandchild of hers, ever since the untimely 
death of her mother, the Princess Alice, and had 
had her often with her. But this stay at Balmoral 
was not a success. Perhaps it was hardly possible 
it could be one, because my mistress' disposition was 
not one which brooked interference, and Queen Vic- 
toria, who had heard, as she generally did all that 
concerned her immediate family, of the growing un- 
popularity of the young Czarina, took her to task 
for it and began advising her as to what she ought 
to do. The Empress, however, did not accept any 
advice, thinking that no one outside of Russia could 
appreciate the growing difficulties of her situation, 
and, besides, not caring to initiate her grandmother 
into the various intrigues rampant in the Russian 
Imperial family. So she received coolly the ex- 
hortations of the Queen, and when the two ladies 
parted it was not as warmly as might have been ex- 
pected. 

Of course the culminating point of the foreign 



Visits Abroad 65 

i 

visits of the Emperor and Empress was Paris. It 
awaited them with an enthusiasm the like of which 
the French capital had probably never before seen. 
From every side one heard cries of "Vive Flmpera- 
trice!" resounding in the air, and the appreciations 
of the newspapers and of the public were all of 
them warm and full of sincere admiration. But 
the Empress, who was in a delicate state of health, 
did not seem to care for the elaborate programme 
of festivities which had been planned in her hon- 
our, and showed herself more than usually listless 
and indifferent. She was tired, and besides felt 
embarrassed at what she considered to be exagger- 
ated expressions of admiration with which she was 
greeted. She showed it so plainly that somehow the 
Parisians felt that she did not quite appreciate their 
efforts to please her, and they began in their turn 
to criticise her, together with her manners and her 
dresses. Though Worth had surpassed himself, 
yet the clothes which he had made for this occasion 
lacked the true Parisian chic which is required by 
the gay city. And it began to be whispered that 
the Czarina did not know how to dress herself, a 
grave reproach in French eyes. There occurred 
also another incident which illustrates the want of 



66 My Empress 

tact which so often interfered with the conduct of 
my Imperial mistress, and which characterised all 
her entourage and court. The Russian Ambassa- 
dor, Baron Mohrenheim, gave a luncheon party at 
the Embassy to which he invited the leaders of that 
part of French society called the Faubourg St. 
Germain. Among those who responded to his ap- 
peal were the Duchesses de Luynes and d'Uzes, the 
Countess Aimery de la Rochefoucauld, and the 
Duchesse de Doudeauville. The Czarina had been 
told that these ladies were not in favour in Repub- 
lican circles, and she felt afraid to show them any 
attention which might be interpreted as a desire to 
please the enemies of the Regime which was wel- 
coming her. She consequently allowed them to be 
presented to her, but spoke but a few words to 
them, and showed herself so cool in regard to them 
that of course she gave grave offence, and Baron 
Mohrenheim was told that his "Imperatrice 'nfetait 
pas aimahle/' 

Of course a woman with a little experience of the 
world might have known how to conciliate the dif- 
ferent elements with which she was brought in con- 
tact. But Alexandra Feodorovna was not a diplo- 
mat, and, moreover, never could hide her feelings. 



Visits Abroad 67 

She thus contrived to wound those whom, perhaps, 
in her secret heart she was most anxious to please. 
The little Grand Duchess Olga had accompanied 
her parents during these visits, and notwithstand- 
ing the many things she had to do, and the numer- 
ous calls upon her time, my mistress never forgot 
to be present at her child's undressing in the eve- 
ning, and had her brought to her room the first 
thing in the morning. I generally wakened the 
Czarina at eight o'clock, when I would hand her a 
lace and silk morning jacket, which was brought to 
me by the maid on duty, and then she would ask 
for her daughter, with whom she played for half an 
hour or so before glancing at the morning's papers 
and taking the cup of tea which she liked in the 
morning. It had to be very strong and bitter, and 
she never took sugar or cream with it. When she 
was dressed she used to partake, with the Emperor, 
of an English breakfast, which, after having been 
fixed for half -past nine o'clock, was, later on, par- 
taken of much earlier, so as not to interfere with 
the children's lessons. The Empress was fond of 
eggs, and of a certain crisp kind of bacon, such as 
was generally found at Windsor or Balmoral, or 
any of the residences of Queen Victoria. She was. 



68 My Empress 

in general, very English in her tastes, and English 
was the only language used in the Russian Imperial 
family circle. This attention of Alexandra Feo- 
dorovna to her daughter was of course praised in 
Paris as well as in London, but not appreciated as 
it ought to have been in St. Petersburg, where it 
was said that she would have done better to have 
been less of a good mother, and more of an Em- 
press. The Imperial family especially criticised 
it freely, and called her a Mere Gigogne in deri- 
sion. When one daughter after another was born 
to her, these criticisms became even more acute, and 
it was said that she wasted all her time looking after 
little girls whose existence was of no interest at all 
to the Russian Empire. 

I must here relate a fact that, so far as I know, 
has never been made public. After the Coronation 
the Empress, owing to over-fatigue, had an acci- 
dent which destroyed some hopes of maternity she 
was nursing. She had not spoken of her condition 
in her family, and she told me that she felt very 
glad she had not done so, because most probably she 
would have been accused of some imprudence or 
other, the more so that her doctor said that the ex- 
pected child would, in all probability, have been a 



Visits Abroad 69 

boy. Nevertheless the thing somehow came to the 
knowledge of the public in the sense that it was sus- 
pected, though no one knew for a certainty whether 
it was true or not, that such an accident had taken 
place, and with the usual wickedness of humanity, 
it was rumoured that the Sovereign had had reasons 
to hide the condition she found herself in, and that 
the accident in itself had been brought on more 
voluntarily than accidentally. I was one day asked 
whether these sayings which circulated freely in St. 
Petersburg were true or not. Imagine my indigna- 
tion and anger on hearing my beloved mistress ac- 
cused of so terrible a thing, the accusation having 
not the slightest foundation to justify it. When 
later on my Imperial mistress began to honour me 
with her confidence, I implored her whenever she 
thought she had reasons to suppose that she was 
about to become again a mother, to mention the 
fact at once, and give it as much publicity as pos- 
sible. But she was so persistently pursued by bad 
luck that this also proved later on a source of much 
trouble to her, when she happened to be attacked by 
an iUness which was at first attributed to a condi- 
tion that in reality did not exist. 



70 My Empress 

When we returned to St. Petersburg after this 
triumphant (for such it was considered to have 
been) journey abroad, we were welcomed there 
with more effusion than had been even expected. 
The French alhance was becoming very popular, 
and the Russian nation moreover felt flattered at 
the idea that its Sovereigns had been made so much 
of wherever they had been. We went at first to 
Czarskoi Selo and then moved for the winter sea- 
son to the capital, where the Empress, as usual, re- 
ceived the ladies of society after mass on New 
Year's day, after which began the usual round of 
gaieties that made St. Petersburg such an attrac- 
tive town at the time I am writing about. But in- 
stead of the seven or eight balls generally given 
during the winter, the Empress arranged to give 
only four, varied with four theatrical performances 
in the little theatre of the Ermitage Palace, which 
had been built by the Empress Catherine. These 
performances, which were always composed of clas- 
sical pieces, were declared to be dull, and people 
found one excuse or another to absent themselves 
from them, thus beginning the system of boycotting 
which, later on, was extended to all the Empress' 



Visits Abroad 71 

entertainments. She was voted a bore and no criti- 
cism could have been worse, considering the existing 
state, together with the habits and customs, of the 
society of the Russian capital. 



CHAPTER VI 

THE GRAND DUCHESS ELIZABETH 

At the risk of rousing a storm of indignation 
against me, I must say that one of the misfortunes 
of the Czarina was to have in Russia an elder sister 
already married to a Russian Grand Duke. I 
know that it is an established legend that the Grand 
Duchess Elizabeth is a saint, who ought to have 
been canonised in her lifetime. But, in reality, 
things were not as represented. The Grand Duch- 
ess was a very ambitious woman, and moreover one 
who cared for nothing and for nobody in the world 
with the exception of her own self. In spite of the 
report that her marriage was a very miserable one, 
she was on the contrary perfectly happy with her 
husband, who was quite content to let her live her 
own life, and who never interfered with anything it 
might please her to do. When he was appointed 
Governor General of Moscow, she hastened to go 
over to the Greek Church, in order to win for her- 
self popularity in the ancient capital of the Rus- 

72 



The Grand Duchess Elizabeth 73 

sian Czars, and to a certain extent she succeeded in 
doing so. She took advantage of her position as 
eldest sister of the young Czarina to try to influ- 
ence her, and to prejudice her against those people 
of whom she thought she had personally reason to 
complain. The weakness of the character of Nicho- 
las II. was well known to his family, long before he 
ever ascended the throne, and both the Grand Duke 
Sergius, who, let it be said by the way, was an ex- 
ceedingly clever man, and his wife made up their 
minds to rule Russia through the influence of its 
new Empress, and to become the only really im- 
portant personages in the State. They partly suc- 
ceeded, and this was the cause of most of the mis- 
fortunes which were later on to assail the unfortu- 
nate Czarina. 

The latter, in spite of her impetuous and, if the 
truth need be said, haughty disposition, stood in 
awe of her eldest sister, a feeling out of which the 
Grand Duchess Elizabeth knew very well how to 
make capital. She set herself to persuade her sister 
that it was indispensable she should afl'ect a far 
stronger attachment to the orthodox faith than she 
really professed, and that if only the orthodox cler- 
gy should think they had found in her an energetic 



74 My Empress 

support, she would rapidly become popular. It 
must not be forgotten that at that time the influ- 
ence of priests in general was fast waning, and 
that they were aware of the fact. It is not surpris- 
ing, therefore, that they tried to find a ally among 
the Imperial family, and that the Grand Duchess 
Elizabeth, who made a profession of being absorbed 
in the practices of a narrow devotion, became the 
object of their pet affection. She was quite con- 
scious of this fact, and being a far cleverer woman 
than she looked, she used it to her own advantage 
and to the detriment of her sister. 

Elizabeth Feodorovna had the reputation of be- 
ing a semi-saint. In reality she was nothing of the 
kind, for she liked the bad as well as the good things 
of this world to an inordinate degree. Fond of ad- 
miration, she had not been insensible to the one 
which she inspired, and her admirers had been 
many, to begin with her own husband's brother, the 
Grand Duke Paul. But she had carried all her in- 
trigues in a grand manner, and had never allowed 
them to interfere with the general comfort of her 
existence. Worldly to her finger tips, she yet af- 
fected the manners of an unworldly woman, and 
she "took in" most of those with whom she came 



The Grand Duchess Elizabeth 75 

into contact by her hypocrisy, for it could hardly be 
called anything else. 

At heart she was jealous of her sister, just as she 
had been jealous of the Empress Marie Feodor- 
ovna, during the latter's reign. It was for this rea- 
son principally that she had been so glad to go to 
Moscow, where she knew she would be the first lady 
in the town, and would enjoy a semi-Imperial posi- 
tion. She did not care to see any one put before 
her, and she applied herself to render the young 
Czarina unpopular by every means in her power. 

Of course the unfortunate Alexandra Feodor- 
ovna, who knew nothing about Russia and still less 
about Russian society when she married, believed 
all that her sister told her, and the latter gave fier a 
totally false opinion as to most of the people whom 
she saw, or with whom she was thrown into con- 
tact — the Empress Dowager to begin with, and all 
the other members of the Imperial family. 
Among the latter the young Czarina might have 
found friends but too happy to guide her, such for 
instance as her own sister-in-law, the Grand Duch- 
ess Xenia, who was about her own age, and who 
would have been only too glad to be of use to her. 
But the latter's husband, the Grand Duke Alex- 



76 My Empress 

ander Michaylovitsch, was credited with ambitious 
designs, and was moreover one of the most intelli- 
gent men of his day. This was more than sufficient 
to eliminate him from the number of the people 
whom it was deemed expedient for Alexandra Feo- 
dorovna to see much of. 

I shall quote one instance of the kind of influ- 
ence which the Grand Duchess Elizabeth exercised 
over her sister. One day the Empress came to me 
and told me (this happened during the war) that 
her sister had sent her some relics of a famous saint 
in the Orthodox Church, who was buried in the ca- 
thedral of Rostoif on the Don, telling her at the 
same time that she ought to have them dissolved in 
water and then drink this water early in the morn- 
ing before she had partaken of any other food. 
Should she do so, success would come to the Rus- 
sian arms without fail. The poor Empress was 
torn asunder between her conviction that her duty 
required her to obey her sister and her distaste for 
the abominable beverage she was expected to swal- 
low. I tried my best to persuade her that the 
whole thing was nonsense, but then Rasputin, who 
was one of the instruments of the Grand Duchess 
Elizabeth, interfered, and, after much hesitation. 



The Grand Duchess Elizabeth 77 

the unfortunate Czarina at last made up her mind 
to drink the dirty relics as she had been ordered, 
and, as a consequence, was abominably sick. 

It was also Elizabeth Feodorovna who was re- 
sponsible for the introduction of Rasputin into the 
immediate circle of the Imperial family. Before 
that she had presented to her sister a Frenchman, 
called Philippe, who was supposed to be one of the 
first mediums in Europe, and for a short time this 
Philippe was quite an important personage at 
Court. It was about the time the Japanese war 
broke out, and the intriguing Frenchman did his 
best to consolidate his influence and power, by mak- 
ing all kinds of prophecies as to the course the strug- 
gle was about to take. Events, however, gave the 
lie to his predictions, because instead of the bril- 
liant successes which he had prophesied, defeat at- 
tended the course of the campaign, and the Rus- 
sian armies were routed. This shook the reputation 
of the medium, and, finally, after another failure of 
a private nature (he had promised the Empress 
she would give birth to a son in the course of the 
next six months, which did not happen) he was dis- 
missed, principally at the request of the Grand 
Duke Nicholas, who called upon the Czar and re- 



78 My Empress 

vealed to the latter the many intrigues of which 
Philippe had been guilty. When he was gone the 
Empress spent her time turning tables alone or 
with a few chosen friends, and she at last got her 
nervous system into such a condition that it is no 
wonder she fell an easy prey to Rasputin when the 
latter was presented to her by her sister, with the 
assurance that he was one of the greatest saints the 
Russian Orthodox Church had ever known. 

This influence of the Grand Duchess Elizabeth 
was exercised nt)t only in religious and political 
matters, but also in purely frivolous ones. For in- 
stance, she introduced into the Imperial Palace a 
dressmaker from Moscow who used to make her 
own gowns, and to whom she had promised she 
would procure the Empress as a client. This dress- 
maker, who, I have always felt convinced was a 
German spy, became quite an important personage 
at Court, and soon my mistress did not dare to 
order a gown from any one else but this woman. 
This of course caused great dissatisfaction among 
her former modistes, both in Petrograd and in 
Paris, who, after having enjoyed her patronage for 
a number of years, found it hard to be set aside for 
a newcomer. I tried more than once to remon- 



The Grand Duchess Elizabeth 79 

strata and to urge the expediency of not offending 
former friends, if such an expression can be used in 
the like case, but I was immediately silenced, with 
the result that the Empress spent twice as much 
on her clothes as she had done during the first years 
of her marriage and was dressed with much less 
taste. Under the pretext that she ought to wear 
Russian silks, gowns of inferior materials were 
made for her, and made abominably into the bar- 
gain. This was the more shameful that Moscow 
possesses silk manufactories, the produce of which 
is not a bit inferior to the loveliest French silks, but 
my poor mistress never got the chance to have them, 
and the cheapest and most vile satin and velvets 
were those which her famous Moscow dressmaker 
selected for her. Worth, who for years had had 
the privilege of making the dresses of the Russian 
Empresses, became very angry at the neglect with 
which his offers were treated, and soon the Empress 
came to be called stingy, not only in St. Petersburg 
but also in Paris, where proprietors of the many es- 
tablishments where she had formerly got her clothes 
became her enemies, and took to calling her Ger- 
man, for the only reason that she did not any longer 
buy her dresses and other things from them. It 



8o My Empress 

would have been easy to avoid all this had one been 
possessed of a strong and independent will and not 
set trembling, as my poor mistress was, whenever 
her sister swept down upon her with a complaint or 
in an excitement of some kind or another. .When the 
little Grand Duchesses grew up, their aunt also in- 
terfered with their education. She believed herself 
to be an excellent pedagogue, and was convinced 
that she had brought up admirably the two mother- 
less children of her brother-in-law, the Grand Duke 
Paul, Dmitry and Marie, who was later on to be- 
come the wife of a Swedish Prince from whom she 
was divorced a short time afterwards. In reality 
she had done nothing of the kind, and neither the 
nephew nor the niece over whose childhood she was 
supposed to have watched with such care, did her 
any honour, nor proved in any way the excellence 
of the training which she was supposed to have 
given them. In regard to the children of the Czar 
and of the Czarina, her influence proved quite mis- 
chievous, and might have become even dangerous 
if the strong common sense of the two eldest girls 
had not saved them from the danger of the super- 
stitious atmosphere with which their aunt wanted 
to surround them. 




Intemational Film Service 



Rasputin 



[The Grand Duchess Elizabeth 8i 

The Empress was the best and most tender of 
mothers. Indeed her affection for her children was 
ahnost too fervent, for she was always anxious on 
their account and would hardly ever allow them to 
mix with other people for fear of anything evil be- 
falling them. She thought, quite naturally, that 
she could trust her sister and share with her the 
responsibilities of the education of her family. In 
reality she could not have made a worse choice, be- 
cause between ambition and superstition the Grand 
Duchess Elizabeth was about the last person who 
ought to have been permitted free access to girls 
of the impressionable temperament of the young 
daughters of Nicholas II. 



CHAPTER VII 

THE CZARINA'S FAMILY RELATIONS 

The Empress, like all German Princesses, had 
been brought up in a family atmosphere which had 
a great deal of the bourgeois about it. Her father 
had been comparatively a poor man, and his house- 
hold had been conducted on most modest lines, as 
can be seen from the letters of the Czarina's mother, 
the Grand Duchess Alice of Hesse, addressed to 
her own mother. Queen Victoria. Neither pomp 
nor magnificence had presided over the rearing of 
the young Princesses left motherless so soon, and 
it was only at Windsor and at Balmoral that Prin- 
cess Alix had seen what a Sovereign's existence 
meant. But on the other hand she had been very 
happy with her sisters and with her brother to 
whom she was particularly attached. For some 
years after their father's death she had been prac- 
tically the mistress of his household, and she had 
felt bitterly his marriage with their cousin, the Prin- 
cess Victoria Melita of Saxe-Coburg. The latter, 

82 



The Czarina's Family Relations 83 

whose mother was a Russian Grand Duchess, had, 
in her own way, just as imperious a character as her 
sister-in-law, and soon relations between the two 
girls became more than strained. As is well known, 
the marriage of the Grand Duke of Hesse turned 
out a most unhappy one and ended with a divorce 
in which the Princess Alix sided with her brother, 
and allowed the latter's wife to see that such was 
the case. Tnis brought about a family quarrel, 
which was further accentuated by the re-marriage 
of Victoria Melita with her other cousin, the Grand 
Duke Cyril of Russia, which incensed the Empress 
to such a degree that she used all her influence over 
the Czar to persuade the latter to exile Cyril and 
his bride, and to deprive them of their fortune and 
rank at the Russian Court. This was a most unfor- 
tunate action, because it roused against the Czarina 
the wrath of all her relatives, who already did not 
like her, and who in consequence went over to swell 
the ranks of her enemies, alas, already too numer- 
ous. 

I have always regretted that my Imperial mis- 
tress was not able to make for herself friends among 
her own relatives. This partiality which she always 
exhibited in regard to her Hessian connections was 



84 My Empress 

a very unfortunate one, and added certainly to her 
unpopularity. Had she been wise, she might easily 
have found a warm support in the Czar's sister, the 
Grand Duchess Xenia, and the latter's husband, 
whose kind feelings in regard to her would have se- 
cured for her the allegiance of aU the sons of the 
Grand Duke Michael, the great uncle of the Czar, 
and the most respected member of the Romanoff 
family, as weU as the oldest. Unfortunately she 
did not see the necessity for doing so, and she feared 
the influence undoubtedly exercised at one time over 
the Czar's mind by Xenia, his favourite sister. Con- 
sequently she kept her at arm's length, and avoided 
inviting her to Czarskoi Selo. The Imperial fam- 
ily, finding itself snubbed at every step, boycotted 
in its turn their Empress, with the result that the 
latter drifted every day a little farther from those 
who ought to have been her natural friends and 
supporters. 

The Grand Duchess Vladimir, herself a German 
Princess and by birth a Duchess of Mecklenburg, 
had at one time been the one to whom Alexandra 
Feodorovna had been the most attracted, and a cer- 
tain intimacy had even established itself between 
them. Then one day the Princess, when calling on 



The Czarina's Family Relations 85 

her niece, had found established in her room one of 
the numerous nuns with whom the latter liked to 
surround herself and who had been presented to 
her by her sister Elizabeth. She had made a few 
remarks as to inadvisability of an Empress of Rus- 
sia admitting into such close intimacy an unedu- 
cated woman, who, moreover, was probably like 
all Russian nuns, devoted to gossip. These re- 
marks were very badly received and put an end to 
a friendship that, in spite of the many inconven- 
iences it presented (the Grand Duchess Vladimir 
being an active supporter of the Kaiser and of the 
German party at Court) , would still have beenpref- 
erable to the one which continued to persist be- 
tween Alexandra Feodorovna and any amount of 
ignorant monks and nuns whose society she grew at 
last to prefer to that of everybody else. This, how- 
ever, was not saying much, because as time went on 
my mistress developed more and more this unfortu- 
nate love for solitude for which she was so often, 
and not unjustly, reproached. She had a great de- 
fect for a woman in her high position — that of tak- 
ing life too seriously, in the sense that she would 
never admit that any one had the right to seek 
amusement or relaxation from the duties of one's 



86 My Empress 

daily existence. Indeed she looked out for duties, 
and found some where none existed. She hated 
balls, and society she thoroughly despised, believing 
that it was composed of frivolous and ill-natured 
people. She did not care for innocent pleasures, 
not because she had any preference for others, but 
because she was convinced that every single hour 
of any man's or woman's existence ought to be con- 
secrated to duty or occupation of some kind. 
When she was compelled to appear at a ball or 
State function, she did so with such a bored look 
that it could not fail to be noticed and of course 
was resented. Her greatest happiness would have 
been to lead an out-of-doors life, to take long walks, 
and to play tennis or golf as a relaxation. Even 
her readings were always serious ones, and such a 
thing as a novel was never seen in her apartments. 
Sometimes her sisters-in-law would urge upon her 
the necessity of reading such or such a book, whose 
publication had created some kind of stir in the 
world. But she invariably refused, or if she con- 
sented did so under protest, and would later on 
make scathing remarks as to her aversion for such 
kind of literature. The Czar, on the other hand, 
liked to peruse a good novel, and sometimes at- 



The Czarina's Family Relations 87 

tempted to read the contents of one aloud to his 
wife, when she would listen with a bored look on 
her face, but would not, however, express in any 
other way her disapproval. She was very consid- 
erate for her husband, though in the early days of 
their marriage she had been inclined to show too 
much her influence and power over his mind, which 
was also one of the things Kussian society had not 
forgiven her. One incident in particular had 
aroused the ire of the Empress Dowager, who had 
made no secret of her indignation against her young 
daughter-in-law on the subject. The Czar and his 
wife had accepted an invitation to dine and spend 
the evening at the barracks of the Hussar regiment, 
of which the Emperor, when heir to the throne, 
had been in command. Nicholas II. was enjoying 
himself, as he invariably did when amidst his old 
comrades of former times, but the Empress was 
far from doing so, therefore, when eleven o'clock 
struck, she determined she had had quite enough 
of it, and, calling to her husband, said loudly and 
distinctly in English: "Now come, my boy, it is 
time to go to bed!" One may imagine the horror 
of the assistants on hearing the autocrat of All the 
Russias addressed in public as "my boy" by his 



88 My Empress 

imprudent wife. The incident was widely com- 
mented upon and discussed, and Marie Feodorovna 
thought it her duty to remonstrate with her daugh- 
ter-in-law on the subject, saying that she had never 
ventured to address Alexander III. in presence of 
others, let alone in an official occasion such as this 
one had been, otherwise than as "Sir" or "Your 
Majesty." My mistress took these remonstrances 
in very bad part, and the relations between the two 
ladies did not improve after this affair. 

Had Alexandra Feodorovna been surrounded by 
people who wished her well, they would have tried 
to educate her mind, and to bring to her notice the 
necessity of observing certain details pertaining to 
etiquette of which she had never been taught the 
necessity in her small Darmstadt, but which she 
could not neglect in her position as Empress of 
Russia. Kindness would have done wonders with 
her, and no one would have appreciated it more 
than herself, but opposition of any kind had the 
effect of exasperating her and of driving her to do 
precisely what she ought not to have done. She had 
the idea that as the wife of an autocratic ruler she 
was placed above every kind of criticism, and that 
no one dared to make any remark concerning her 



The Czarina's Family Relations 89 

conduct or manners. Of course this was a mistaken 
idea, but it had so thoroughly taken hold of her 
mind that nothing could ever drive it away, and it 
has certainly contributed to the misfortunes which 
have assailed her later on. Alas! alas! how often 
have I not regretted that this sweet Princess, so 
attractive in many ways, could not be brought to 
look upon the world with other eyes than those of 
an enemy. If only she had believed those who sin- 
cerely loved her, how different her life might have 
been! 

During the summer of 1898, the Grand Duchess 
Olga caught the scarlet fever. The English 
nurse who was in charge of the Imperial nur- 
sery was left with the second little girl who had 
been born to the Czar and Czarina, the Grand 
Duchess Tatiana, and the Empress took it upon 
herself to nurse the sick child unaided. I begged 
permission to share with her the care of the in- 
valid, and it was after this that my mistress be- 
gan to confide in me to a certain degree, and to 
speak to me about some of her many anxieties and 
sorrows. I can remember her so well during these 
days and nights sitting by the cot in which her 
small daughter slept, clad in a dressing gown of 



90 My Empress 

white flannel which I had ahnost compelled her to 
buy for the occasion, her fair head resting on her 
hand, absorbed in her thoughts, and with that sweet 
but anxious expression on her beautiful face, which 
already at that time had begun to settle on her fea- 
tures. She complained to me once that she had 
been reproached by her relatives for exposing her- 
self to the danger of contagion. "As if that mat- 
tered," she said, "even if I died, for the Emperor 
would always find another wife who perhaps would 
be luckier than I have been, and able to give him 
an heir. No one would miss me, with the exception 
perhaps of these children," and she started weeping 
bitter tears. I tried to comfort her, saying that 
she must not talk in that way, because no woman 
had ever been more loved by her husband than she 
was by the Emperor. "Ah, my dear," retorted the 
Empress, "what good does it do me to be loved 
by my husband when all the world is against me? 
It is the nation's love I would wish to win, and how 
can I hope to do so, so long as I have not given an 
heir to Russia!" Poor woman, she really imagined 
that the cause of her unpopularity was the fact that 
she had no son! 

This reminds me of the state of mind into which 



The Czarina's Family Relations 91 

my poor mistress was thrown at the birth of her 
second daughter, Tatiana. She had been worrying 
the whole time of her pregnancy at the idea that 
she might have another girl, until at last the thought 
of it had become quite an obsession, and her ner- 
vous system had been absolutely shattered as a con- 
sequence. When the child came into the world 
there was a profound silence in the room, and the 
doctor informed the Czar, by a previously arranged 
sign, of the sex of the infant, which it was deemed 
necessary to conceal from the mother at first. But 
the Empress saw the anxious and troubled faces 
around her when she had recovered from the ef- 
fects of the chloroform which had been administered 
to her, and her first words were: "My God, it is 
again a daughter. What will the nation say, what 
will the nation say?" and she burst into loud hys- 
terics. 

Nevertheless, the wee, wee maidens who came 
one after the other to enliven the family circle of 
the Czar and Czarina, though they were very badly 
received, became in time the objects of their par- 
ents' most affectionate love, and were cared for just 
as much as if their births had not constituted a se- 
vere disappointment for their father and mother. 



92 My Empress 

But the fact that for something like ten years Rus- 
sia had no direct heir, shook the position of Alex- 
andra Feodorovna, who began to be considered as 
a person of no consequence. People looked up to 
the Grand Duke Michael, in whom every one saw 
the future Czar, and who not only was immensely 
popular, but whose features and character reminded 
one more than those of any of his other children of 
the late Alexander III. The Empress was quite 
aware of this fact, and it did not contribute to her 
liking for her brother-in-law. In general, she was 
not upon good terms with any members of the Rus- 
sian Imperial family, with the exception of her sis- 
ter of course, and of the latter's husband, the Grand 
Duke Sergius, and she clung more than ever to her 
German relations, and to her brother in particular. 
She was always looking forward to the short so- 
journs which from time to time she was allowed to 
make in Darmstadt, where she felt more at her ease 
than anywhere else, with the exception of Livadia, 
in the Crimea, where she built for herself a kind of 
fairy palace, in place of the small cottage which had 
been found sufficient for the Empress Marie Alex- 
androvna, and where Alexander III. had breathed 
his last. The construction of this palace was also 



The Czarina's Family Relations 93 

one of the things for which my mistress was re- 
proached. People said that it was not seemly to 
have pulled down the house where the late Czar had 
died, and they had criticised the large amount of 
money which had been wasted, as was said, on the 
erection of this new residence. When this was re- 
peated to the Empress, she became quite furious, 
and swore that not one of those who had thus al- 
lowed themselves to be dissatisfied with what she 
had done would ever enter the gates of her Crimean 
home. She kept her promise, and not even her 
mother-in-law was ever invited to look upon the 
new castle which Alexandra Feodorovna had built 
for herself on the shores of the Black Sea, and 
which she had made so beautiful. 



CHAPTER VIII 
LIFE AT CZARSKOI SELO 

I HAVE often been asked details about the kind 
of existence by the Imperial family in the in- 
terior of their home. So long as I was in their ser- 
vice I never spoke of what I saw, and in general 
avoided mentioning anything connected with the 
family life of my masters. It seems to me now that 
I am not committing an indiscretion if I do so, be- 
cause I have nothing to say but good of the un- 
fortunate Czar and Czarina. 

They were a most affectionate couple, and to look 
at them and to hear them converse with one another 
one could almost have believed them to be little 
"bourgeois" of the type dear to French authors, 
rather than powerful sovereigns. They used often 
to jest together, and to tease each other in a quiet 
way, and both were full of fun when left to them- 
selves. Later on, of course, things changed, and 
as the political horizon became darker and darker, 
the old merry laugh with which the Emperor and 

94 



Life at Czarskoi Selo 95 

his wife used to make the halls and corridors of the 
Czarskoi Selo Palace echo was hushed and could 
be heard very seldom. But the sense of humour of 
Nicholas II. and of his Consort never deserted 
them, and they were inclined to look at the joyful 
side of things rather than to indulge in pessimism, 
in all matters that did not pertain to the administra- 
tion of their vast Empire. This was the tragic part 
of their life, and, being both highly conscientious 
people, they suffered cruelly to find that all their 
efforts to ameliorate the condition of their people 
were misunderstood. Of course it is idle to deny 
that the weakness of character of the Emperor was 
greatly to blame in the series of disasters which 
finally overpowered him and his family, but it must 
also be acknowledged that he never met with any 
sincere and disinterested help in the responsibilities 
of his arduous task. During the first years of her 
marriage the Empress kept, or rather was kept, 
aloof from everything connected with politics, 
which was a great pity, because at that time she 
might have made herself useful in many ways. But 
all the ministers and the advisers of Nicholas II. 
were of opinion that his wife had to be relegated to 
a subordinate position, and he himself had no desire 



96 My Empress 

to initiate her into the complicated details connected 
with the government of Russia. It was only after 
she had given birth to an heir that the position of 
Alexandra Feodorovna became an important one, 
and that she was consulted by her husband. By 
that time the reputation for weakness of character 
of the Emperor had become an established fact, and 
those who hitherto had ruled him, furious at finding 
themselves evicted, started the report that the Em- 
press was abusing her influence over the Czar, and 
obliging him to conform himself to her own politi- 
cal views, which were supposed to be entirely Ger- 
man. 

So far as I have been able to judge, this was an 
error, at least in some details. The Czarina was 
very fond of the land of her birth, this cannot be 
denied, but she was too affectionate a mother not 
to see that it would have been impossible to carry 
on a purely German policy in Russia, and the thing 
to which she clung the most was her throne and the 
possibility of seeing her own son occupy it in time. 
She was ambitious for him as well as for herself, 
and though this may be deplored, yet there is noth- 
ing astonishing in the fact. 

She did not care for St. Petersburg and the lux- 



Life at Czarskoi Selo 97 

ury of her apartments in the Winter Palace, and 
after the Japanese war and the Revolution she per- 
suaded the Czar to give up residing there and to 
make his permanent home at Czarskoi Selo, or in 
Livadia m the Crimea. They used to come some- 
times to the capital for some military festivity or 
other, but their sojourn there was always of short 
duration, and never extended beyond a few hours. 
The only time they resided in it again, and this only 
for three days, was on the occasion of the celebra- 
tion of the jubilee of three hundred years of the ac- 
cession of the Romanoff dynasty to the throne of 
Russia. After they left it then, they were 
never more to sleep under its roof, though their 
rooms were always kept ready for them. Some- 
times the Empress stopped there for a cup of tea, 
when on one of her rare visits to St. Petersburg, to 
inspect some charitable institution, but she never 
liked them, though she had furnished them with 
such care and she never felt at home in those im- 
mense halls which could not be made homely or 
comfortable, in the sense generally attached to this 
word. 

At Czarskoi Selo existence ran very smoothly. 
The Empress rose early and, after partaking of a 



98 My Empress 

cup of tea in bed, threw a dressing gown over her 
shoulders, and repaired to her children's rooms. 
She was always present when they said their pray- 
ers, and she used to read to them a chapter of the 
Bible, or the Gospel for the day. It was only after 
the performance of this duty that she began her 
own toilet, which was always an elaborate affair, 
and this to the last day of my stay with her, even 
after she had discarded most of her ornaments and 
fine gowns and assumed the garb of the sister of 
charity she declared she had become. But she was 
particular in the care she used to take of her own 
person and would spend a longer time than any one 
else would have done in her bath and in the general 
occupation of her dressing and undressing. After 
her hair had been arranged and she had assumed the 
gown she chose out of the three or four which were 
brought for her inspection, she would go to the 
small apartment where breakfast was served, and 
where her children were generally already awaiting 
her. A servant would then inform the Emperor 
that his wife was in the dining room, and he would 
join her there almost immediately. The meal never 
began without him, and was a simple though an 
abundant one. Eggs, cold meat, and a variety of 



Life at Czarskoi Selo 99 

cakes and biscuits with hot rolls, generally com- 
posed it. ISTicholas II. was a gourmet, and though 
he cared most for Russian cooking, yet he insisted 
on everything that was served him being of the 
very best. Lunch was the meal of which he par- 
took most freely, and it consisted always of some 
five or six courses, beginning with caviar and other 
relishes, and ending with fresh fruit, no matter what 
the season of the year might be, and very strong cof- 
fee. The Czar was a most sober man in his family 
circle, contrary to what has been said of him, and his 
only drink was Crimean wine from his own vin- 
tages, which was very good indeed. Sometimes, 
when he went to supper at the mess of his former 
regiment of Hussars, of which he had remained very 
fond, he partook freely of champagne, which start- 
ed the legend that he was an inordinate drunkard, 
but these occasions were rare, and certainly never 
gave rise to any outward manifestation on his part 
which might have accredited this malicious report. 
Strong drinks never appeared on the Imperial table. 
Nicholas II. drank a small glass of vodka before 
his meals, as every Russian does, but this was all. 
As for the Empress, she seldom touched anything 
but mineral water, and the children were brought 



100 My Empress 

up on strictly abstemious lines. During dinner, 
which was served at eight o'clock, Madeira and 
sherry appeared, also red and white wine, but 
this was for the benefit of the guests invited. 
There were always some at this meal, but these com- 
prised the ladies in waiting on the Empress, and 
the personal attendants on the Emperor, rarely any 
one else. Sometimes a military band played some 
of the Czarina's favourite airs, when she would 
listen with attention, but this seldom occurred ex- 
cept on Sundays. The dinner was an elaborate af- 
fair, composed principally of Russian dishes, for 
Nicholas II. disliked French sauces and French 
menus, and used to say that what he preferred was 
plain and excellent Russian fare. The kind of fish 
called Sterlet was a favourite of his, also a pudding 
which went by the name of Gourieswkaya Kacha, 
or gruel, and which was really very good. The Em- 
press was absolutely indifferent to what she ate or 
drank, and would have been perfectly satisfied to 
exist on oatmeal and eggs. The only thing she was 
particular about was her tea, which she wanted to 
be made very strong, and the brand she preferred 
was one in which green tea was mixed with black; 



Life at Czarskoi Selo loi 

she utterly repudiated Indian or Ceylon tea, giving 
her preference to Chinese caravan. 

As the Imperial children grew up, their mother 
adopted the custom of spending most of her time 
with them when the state of her health so allowed. 
She had always heen very delicate, and developed 
violent nervous headaches which totally prostrated 
her and confined her to her bed in a dark room, 
sometimes for two or three days at a time. These 
attacks left her terribly weak, and she would re- 
quire care and quiet to get over them. Sometimes 
another attack would overpower her before the ef- 
fects of the first one had passed away. This was 
the origin of the rumour that she was an unnat- 
ural mother who for days did not allow her 
daughters to approach her. Nothing of the 
kind ever took place, but when my poor mis- 
tress was laid up her sufferings were so intense that 
sometimes the sound of a footstep in the next room 
would add to the agony which she endured, and of 
course she had to be left alone at such periods. But 
the world, always cruel and unjust in regard to 
her, would have it that she confined herself in her 
apartments because she could not bear her children, 
and it pitied them in consequence. 



102 My Empress 

But when she was in good health, the Czarina 
gave up every minute of her time to her family. 
She took upon herself the religious instruction of 
her son and daughters, and she tried to rear them 
in the strong principles which she herself professed. 
Both the Czar and herself observed with extreme 
punctuality the rites of the Greek Orthodox Church. 
During the whole six weeks of Lent, no meat ap- 
peared on the Imperial table, and at festivals as 
well as on Sundays, the whole family attended all 
the morning and afternoon services which were cele- 
brated in the chapel of the Palace. Afterwards the 
Empress built a church in Czarskoi Selo, which be- 
came one of the most beautiful shrines in the whole 
of Russia, and she regularly went to it, forsaking 
the private chapel of her own residence. She had 
arranged for herself an oratory in one corner of 
the building, from which she could, unseen herself, 
follow the religious services. This eccentricity, 
which proceeded from the fact that the Czarina did 
not care to be the object of the attention of the con- 
gregation, was also made the cause of violent and 
unseemly attacks upon her person and character. 

When the state of her health allowed her to do 
so, Alexandra Feodorovna went for long walks in 



Life arCzarskoi Selo 103 

the park surrounding the Palace, with the Emperor 
and her children. She was inordinately fond of the 
open air, and was never so happy as in the Crimea, 
where she could indulge in her taste for it. There 
she spent hours arranging her rose garden and gen- 
erally beautifying this lovely place, to which she 
hoped she would one day be able to retire. It is not 
generally known, but a fact, that both the Emperor 
and herself nursed the idea of abdicating in favour 
of their son as soon as the latter should be old 
enough to assume the government of the country, 
and of retiring to Livadia for the rest of their days. 
Neither Nicholas II. nor his Consort ever dreamt 
that this abdication would be imposed upon them by 
events the magnitude of which no one in the whole 
of Russia could have been able to foresee. 

Very few visitors ever came to enliven the soli- 
tude of Czarskoi Selo, but at Livadia the Empress 
would make a point of inviting to dinner and to 
small dances given for her daughters, all the people 
living in the neighbourhood, or staying in the var- 
ious hotels on the Crimean coast, who had been pre- 
sented to her. The officers of the Imperial yacht, 
the Standard^ were also bidden to these parties, and 
they were almost the only persons with whom the 



104 My Empress 

Empress ever conversed freely. She was very fond 
of the sea, and during the cruises which she took 
every summer in the Finnish waters she grew 
to know by name all the crew of the vessel on which 
she found herself, and she took pleasure in talking 
with the officers and men, the former of whom were 
afterwards always welcomed by her wherever she 
was. 

But in general she did not care for society. Her 
Mistress of the Robes was about the only woman 
admitted to her intimacy as long the post was oc- 
cupied by the Princess Galitzyne, but after the 
death of the latter and the appointment of Madame 
Narischkine, the relations of the Empress with the 
head of her household became purely formal, and 
the only real confidante she possessed during 
the last six or seven years which preceded the war 
and the Revolution was a woman who was destined 
to do her an infinity of harm and whom she would 
have done much better to have kept at arm's length 
— the too famous Madame Wyroubieva, about 
whom I shall have something to say later on. 



CHAPTER IX 

THE COURT AND ATTENDANTS OF 
THE CZARINA 

.When the Empress married, her household was 
formed in a hurry, which was a great pity, because 
it was not composed entirely of the best people from 
an intellectual point of view. The Empress Dow- 
ager was so absorbed by her grief that she could 
not give to the subject the attention she otherwise 
would have done. The Emperor, on the other hand, 
knew very little about St. Petersburg society, and 
especially about its gossip. When the name of the 
Princess Galitzyne was mentioned to him as that 
of the best lady for the difficult position of Mistress 
of the Robes, and chief adviser of his young wife, 
he accepted it as a matter of course, having only in 
mind the great name and the prominent position of 
the Princess. 

She was a woman with a past in which had fig- 
ured most of the jetmesse doree of St. Petersburg. 
She had been married when quite a girl to a man 

105 



io6 My Empress 

much older than herself, and had very rapidly found 
a number of people willing to console her for the 
great difference of age which existed between her 
and her spouse. He had made her an indulgent hus- 
band, and by reason of his great standing, riches, 
and other worldly advantages, had constantly shel- 
tered her from the evil effects of the gossip which 
was but too often busy with her name. When she 
had become a widow, she had mourned him quite sin- 
cerely, but had pretended a grief greater than she 
had reaUy experienced. It was discovered that he 
had left his business affairs in an entangled condi- 
tion, and the Princess had retired to her country es- 
tates, to try to bring some kind of order into their 
management. She had an only daughter, already 
married, who became the object of her greatest care 
and affection. When the post of chief adviser to 
the young bride of Nicholas II. was offered to her 
by one of her former admirers, Baron Fredericks, 
then already Minister of the Imperial Household, 
she had snatched at the chance with alacrity, seeing 
in it a possibility of re-establishing, quicker than by 
a strict economy, her shattered finances. 

She was a haughty, selfish, self-centred woman 
who soon made for herself nimierous enemies. 



The Court and Attendants 107 

thanks to the offhand manner with which she 
treated all those with whom she found herself 
thrown in contact. She never applied herself to 
the task of teaching her young mistress the difficult 
lesson of trying to make herself popular, but on 
the contrary tried to inspire within her the same 
prejudices in regard to the people she disliked that 
she herself entertained. She was about the worst 
adviser a newly married Sovereign could have had, 
and one can only wonder why this fact was not 
recognised earlier than it was ; for it ultimately be- 
came a question as to who was the more disliked, the 
Empress or her Mistress of the Robes. 

The Princess Galitzyne, nevertheless, soon be- 
came a power at Court. She contrived to obtain 
large grants of money which the successive minis- 
ters of finance who took over the succession of 
Count Witte, were but too happy to arrange for 
her, in return for her protection. She was greedy 
and avaricious, cruel and cold hearted, and utterly 
devoid of scruples. In the Palace she was heartily 
disliked, yet no one dared to say a word against 
her, because it was well known that eventually she 
could become a terrible enemy of those of whom 
she thought she had reason to complain. 



io8 My Empress 

The Princess died a year or two before the great 
war, and for some time her place remained empty, 
until at last it was offered to Madame Narischkine, 
an intimate friend of the Empress Dowager, and 
one of the most respected women in St. Petersbm*g 
society. 

Madame Narischkine was quite a different wo- 
man from her predecessor. She was kind, polite, 
amiable, and highly principled, as well as conscien- 
tious. She would never have hurt a fly, and she had 
always applied herself to smooth the path in life 
of all the people in whom she had happened to be in- 
terested. 

Unfortunately she was not sympathetic with the 
Empress Alexandra, and the latter could never 
bring herself to treat her with the same famiharity 
as she had done the Princess Galitzyne. Then 
Madame Narischkine objected to Rasputin, and of 
course this was sufficient to prevent her being a 
persona grata. The Grand Duchess Elizabeth also 
did not care for her; perhaps because she felt that 
the new Mistress of the Robes had never quite ap- 
proved of her. Madame Narischkine was a very 
discreet woman, but at the same time she could very 
well convey to persons whom she did not think fit 



The Court and Attendants 109 

to be upon terms of intimacy with her what she 
thought of them. The Empress never took to her, 
which was a great pityi, and sometimes treated her 
with great rudeness and with an astonishing lack 
of consideration. But in spite of these difficulties 
with which her path was beset, Madame Narisch- 
kine behaved magnificently when the hour of dan- 
ger sounded. When the Revolution broke out, she 
immediately repaii-ed to Czarskoi Selo and never 
left the Empress through those days of sorrow and 
anxiety which saw the latter taken prisoner in her 
own palace. She volunteered, in spite of her ad- 
vanced age (she is over seventy) to accompany her 
mistress into exile, but the request was declined by 
the provisional government, and Madame Na- 
rischkine had perforce to submit, but she was the 
last one to bid good-bye to the Empress and to the 
young Grand Duchesses before they entered the 
train which was to carry them away to the solitudes 
of Siberia. It is likely that if Madame Narisch- 
kine had, from the outset, been with the Czarina, 
many of the mistakes committed by the latter would 
have been avoided. As it was she followed the ad- 
vice given her by the Princess Galitzyne, and this 
was never wise advice, because the Princess, who 



no My Empress 

was a bom flatterer, was most careful never to say 
to Alexandra Feodorovna anything which she knew 
or feared might displease her. Under her guid- 
ance the unfortunate Empress had not a chance to 
succeed in winning the affections of her subjects. 
Besides the Princess, there were four maids of hon- 
our attached to the person of the young Czarina. 
The first was the Countess Lamsdorff, with whom 
the Sovereign could not get on and to whom she 
took a violent dislike. Then came the Princess 
Bariatinsky, who also resigned her functions with 
a certain amount of "fracas," and who made no 
mystery of the fact that she could not stand the 
lack of consideration with which she was being 
treated. A Caucasian lady, the Princess Orbeli- 
ani, took her place, and succeeded in retaining her 
difficult position until her death. Then there was 
a Princess Obolensky, who had much unpleasant- 
ness to bear, but who accepted everything with won- 
derful patience, thanks, it was said, to her attach- 
ment to the young Grand Duchesses, the daughters 
of Nicholas II. She is stiU with the Imperial fam- 
ily, and has accompanied them to Tobolsk, in spite 
of the opposition of her family, who would have 
liked her to leave the Empress. There was also 



pThe Court and Attendants in 

another personage in the household who held there 
quite a privileged situation; this was Mademoiselle 
Schneider, whose duties consisted in reading to the 
Czarina, and who was the only attendant she had 
brought over with her from Darmstadt. Made- 
moiselle Schneider could enter the apartments of 
her mistress whenever she liked. She was the me- 
dium through whom Alexandra Feodorovna com- 
municated with her relatives in Germany, to whom 
she always felt afraid to write by post, and she was 
also the one and only person with whom the Em- 
press spoke German. .We all liked her, because 
she was a quiet, unassuming person; but I shall not 
take it upon myself to say whether or not she gave 
to the German government information it would 
have been better to have withheld. Then again 
there was a private secretary, whose business it was 
to attend to the correspondence of the Empress, 
and who used to make reports to her every morn- 
ing. The post was first filled by Count Lamsdorff, 
then by Count RostavtsofF, and neither of these 
gentlemen was quite up to the task. They did not 
know how to interest the Czarina in their work, 
which they accomplished in a methodical manner 
devoid of any initiative. Among their duties was 



112 My Empress 

the administration of Alexandra's private purse 
and the control of her charities until the time when 
she assumed it herself at the period of the Japanese 
war. It was part of the privileges of the private 
secretary to pay out the bills of the Empress or at 
least to give out their amount to the head maid, that 
is, to myself. Count Lamsdorff paid whatever I 
asked, without the slightest demur, but his suc- 
cessor used to ask for explanations, and to make his 
comments, which sometimes was most annoying. 
The private accounts of the Czarina were settled 
on the 22nd day of every month, when the expenses 
of the thirty preceding days had to be balanced and 
adjusted. She was most particular about this, and 
hated being in debt to any one. But at the same 
time she absolutely ignored the meaning of the word 
economy, bought and ordered whatever she liked 
without a thought as to how her expenses were to 
be met, and more than once I have had to appeal, 
unknown to her, to the Czar, and to ask him to give 
orders to settle his wife's bills without her being 
worried about the matter. 

Every spring and autumn the coming fashions 
were brought to the Empress, so that she might 
make her choice. She usually had about fifty 



The Court and Attendants 113 

dresses for each season, as I have had already oc- 
casion to explain, but whenever any unlooked 
for event occurred she would order special gowns 
to meet it. Her hats were generally made by Ber- 
trand, a French firm in St. Petersburg; she or- 
dered about twenty-five or thirty for the summer 
season and several fur toques for the winter. She 
liked white hats, which she often wore, and for a 
long time remained faithful to the small bonnets af- 
fected by Queen Alexandra of England in her 
youth. Later on she took to large hats, which were 
generally trimmed profusely with ostrich feathers. 
About these feathers the Empress was most fussy. 
The St. Petersburg climate is so very damp that it 
is almost next to impossible to keep feathers curled 
in summer, especially in Peterhof, on the Baltic 
shore, where the Court, as a rule, spent July and 
August. We had, therefore, to have the trimmings 
of the Empress's hats seen to every day, and mes- 
sengers used to go daily to St. Petersburg to carry 
to Madame Bertrand the different millinery as well 
as the feather boas of Alexandra Feodorovna to 
be freshened and rearranged. 

As a rule, the Czarina used to spend something 
like ten thousand roubles a month on her toilet, and 



114 My Empress 

sometimes even more than that. She was extrava- 
gant, — ^there is no doubt about it, — ^but then she was 
the Empress of Russia, and considered it part of 
her duties to appear magnificently attired. The 
Emperor, too, liked to see her well dressed, and es- 
pecially richly dressed. The latter was easy, but 
the former more difficult, because of the pe- 
culiar ideas of my Imperial mistress in regard to her 
clothes. 

When her household was organised she was given 
eight maids to attend upon her, of whom there 
were to be always two on duty during the day, and 
two during the night, when they had to sit in a 
rdom in the near vicinity of the Imperial bedcham- 
ber, ready to be called in case of emergency. In 
the usual order of things they would have had to 
dress the Czarina's hair morning and evening, but 
the latter hated to have different hands perform 
this task, so she arranged to have a hairdresser come 
each day to arrange her coiff*ure, which was never 
very elaborate except upon official occasions, when 
a diadem had to be fixed in her hair. I was al- 
ways present when she dressed and undressed. It 
was part of my business to see that everything con- 
nected with her toilet was in order and that nothing 



The Court and Attendants 115 

she required was missing. She never twice wore 
the same pair of gloves, but liked old shoes and 
slippers. As for her stockings they were of the 
jQnest silk, and manufactured specially for her by 
the firm of Swears and Wells in London. 

This system of having eight maids was contin- 
ued for about ten years or so, then one of them died, 
and another one asked to be relieved from her du- 
ties, and they were never replaced. The Czarina 
thought that it was quite sufficient for her to have 
six attendants, and she abolished the night waiting, 
which had always been so irksome to the people 
concerned in it. She used to dismiss her maids at 
eleven o'clock and then retire to her bedroom, where 
she read or worked alone, but did not require any 
more attendance, except in case she felt ill or one 
of her children was indisposed. She was exact- 
ing, but never unjust or cruel, and she hated to be 
the cause of inconvenience to other people. At 
first she had never dared to alter anything in the 
customs of the Russian Court, but later on she as- 
serted herself and made many changes in the in- 
terior arrangements of the Palace, all of which were 
practical and tended to the amelioration of the con- 
dition of her numerous servants, who nevertheless 



Ii6 My Empress 

did not show themselves grateful to her for her 
anxiety about their welfare, and who in the hour 
of her misfortune mostly abandoned her, or turned 
with alacrity against her. 



CHAPTER X 

THE CZARINA AND ST. PETERSBURG 
SOCIETY 

At the time of her marriage St. Petersburg soci- 
ety was well disposed toward my unfortunate mis- 
tress, and it would have been easy for her to have 
made herself popular. Unfortunately she had, as 
I have said, a sarcastic tongue, and made no secret 
of her likes and dislikes; nor did she hesitate to 
ridicule certain customs to which old and important 
dowagers clung with persistency. She always 
feared to be thought too familiar, owing to the fact 
that the Imperial family, from the very first day 
of her arrival in Russia, had drilled into her ears 
the caution that St. Petersburg was not Darm- 
stadt, and that the free and easy manners of a lit- 
tle German town would be out of place at the 
Court of the mighty Czar of All the Russias. She 
had therefore fallen into the other extreme, and 
disciplined herself to be as stiff as possible. The 

Empress Marie had been in the habit of receiving 

117 



ii8 My Empress 

in her own private boudoir the ladies who craved 
an audience from her, and of asking them to sit be- 
side her. Her daughter-in-law made it a point to 
give her audience standing, and to converse for a 
few minutes without ever offering a chair to the 
old women who had applied for the honour of an 
introduction to her. She coldly extended to them 
her hand to kiss, which further incensed them, and 
her natural shyness, added to this stiff reception, of 
course made her many enemies. She began to be 
criticised, and that in no friendly spirit. Unfortu- 
nately she became aware of this, and it set her from 
the very first against the people she ought to have 
tried to make her friends. Then gossip, and that 
mostly ill natured, too, did its work, and all kinds 
of anecdotes were put into circulation concerning 
the want of kindness of the young Empress. She 
was accused of being sarcastic and of making fun 
of old people whom age and past service ought to 
have preserved from the ridicule she was supposed 
to shower upon them. Then, again, the Czarina 
had the imprudence to express in public her disgust 
at what she called the loose manners of St. Peters- 
burg society. She tried to become acquainted with 
all the gossip going about town, and declared that 



The Czarina and Society 119 

she was going to reform the morals of her empire, 
proceeding by striking off the list of invitations for 
a Court ball the names of all the women supposed 
rightly or wrongly to have had a flirtation of some 
kind. The result was that hardly any ladies ap- 
peared at this particular ball, with the exception of 
mothers with girls to bring out, and the whole of 
St. Petersburg rose up in arms against its Em- 
press. It was decided to boycott her, which was 
done, and the Empress Mother was asked to in- 
terfere and to explain to her daughter-in-law that 
it was not her business to brand with any kind of 
stigma the names of ladies in regard to whom no 
open scandal had ever taken place. The incident 
assumed such proportions that the Czar was asked 
to interfere, and he decided that in future the list 
of invitations for Court festivities was to be sub- 
mitted to his mother and not to his wife, who was 
still too great a stranger in Russia to know who 
ought or ought not to be invited to the Winter Pal- 
ace. 

As may be imagined, the little incident I have 
just narrated did not tend to improve the relations 
between the young Czarina and the Dowager, and 
the former's popularity suffered from it to a con- 



120 My Empress 

siderable extent. On the New Year following 
upon this memorable tempest in a tea-cup, St. 
Petersburg ladies made up their minds not to put in 
an appearance at the great reception which fol- 
lowed upon divine service in the Winter Palace, a 
reception during which Court society offered its 
New Year's wishes to the sovereigns. So about 
four of them, who by virtue of the official position 
of their husbands could not absent themselves, were 
the only ones who attended the function. This ab- 
sence, en masse, could not but be noticed, and of 
course the Czarina was offended. But she was 
powerless to retort otherwise than passively, which 
she did by avoiding in the future showing herself 
in public, also by discontinuing her audiences and 
even the ball which had been considered as an in- 
dispensable feature of every winter season in the 
Russian capital. This manner of manifesting her 
displeasure only added to the bitterness of the feel- 
ings which she had inspired, as was to be expected, 
and soon fashionable ladies deserted St. Petersburg 
for the Riviera or Paris, where they felt happier and 
more at their ease than in their own country. One 
after another the big houses, which used to rival 
the Court itself by the splendour of their entertain- 



The Czarina and Society 121 

ments, closed their doors, and the "Pahnyra of the 
North," as the capital of the Czars used to be 
called, became one of the dullest cities in the whole 
world. 

There were people who attempted to remon- 
strate with my mistress for this retirement in which 
she persisted in living. She was told that it would 
be relatively easy for her to regain some of her lost 
popularity if she would only allow people to eat, 
drink, and be merry in her presence. Alexander 
III., too, had hated society, and preferred his be- 
loved Gatschina to all his other residences, but he 
had fulfilled the social duties he was expected to 
fulfill, and during his reign there had not existed 
in the whole of Europe a more brilliant Court than 
that of Russia. His daughter-in-law was advised 
to follow his example in this respect. But she 
jvould not do so- 

I remember that one day whilst we were discus- 
sing the question of what kind of new clothes she 
would want for the coming winter, I remarked that 
she ought to order more evening dresses than she 
had done. The Empress interrupted me with the 
remark that she did not mean to have any more, 
because there would be no necessity for her to have 



122 My Empress 

them. I then observed that it would be a great dis- 
appointment to the many young girls about to 
make their appearance in society for the first time 
if no Court balls were given. Alexandra Feodor- 
ovna got quite angry, and, getting up with impa- 
tience, exclaimed, "I cannot understand why it is 
expected of me to amuse all the silly children their 
parents are bringing out." 

Happily for her no one was present when she 
gave way to this fit of temper, but one may imagine 
how it would have been commented upon by any 
of her numerous enemies had they chanced to over- 
hear it. This state of antagonism (for it can 
hardly be called by any other name) which ex- 
isted between Alexandra Feodorovna and the 
smart set of her capital was not extended to other 
places. In the Crimea she liked to have people 
about her, as I have already related, and she even 
gave dances for her daughters. But though the 
Grand Duchess Olga had attained her eighteenth 
year during the winter which preceded the outbreak 
of the great war, her mother did not attempt to 
invite any one to the Palace of Czarskoi Selo to 
amuse her. The Empress Dowager had to ar- 
range some entertainments in her own Anitschkoff 



The Czarina and Society 123 

Palace for her granddaughter's benefit, but each 
time they were invited to attend them there was an 
explosion of grief on the part of their mother which 
completely spoilt their pleasure. The Czarina had 
a morbid fear of the sharp tongues of the ladies 
of the capital, and she was always expecting that 
her daughters would be subjected to the same kind 
of criticism which had been applied so liberally to 
her own self. This she wished to guard them 
against. The idea was a mistaken one, because 
everybody admired and liked the graceful girls, 
who had always an amiable word for those they 
met, and who seemed so happy and so delighted 
whenever they had an opportunity of enjoying 
themselves like all other girls of their age. 

The only person who at one time was in posses- 
sion of the confidence of the Czarina to a limited de- 
gree, the Grand Duchess Anastasia, wife of the 
Grand Duke Nicholas, tried, without success, to 
get her to look upon people vrith more indulgence, 
and not in such a morbid way. My mistress would 
not hear reason, and at last declared that it was 
useless to be an Empress of Russia if one could not 
do what one liked, and that all she craved was the 



124 My Empress 

privilege to be left alone and allowed to enjoy, un- 
restrained, her taste for solitude. 

In that respect the Empress was certainly not 
quite normal, and at times she most undoubtedly 
suffered from what is called the mania of persecu- 
tion. People abroad have attributed this abnor- 
mal condition of hers to the dread of revolution, 
the spectre of which was supposed to haunt her con- 
stantly. Thisi, however, was not at all the case, be- 
cause long before any one had an idea that revo- 
lution might break out, my mistress was already 
affected by that strange fear of seeing strangers 
approach her. The fact is that she had become 
morbid, thanks to the latent dislike which she knew 
but too well was felt in regard to her, and which 
worried her to the extent that she felt disgusted 
with the world in general and had come to the con- 
clusion that it was not worth while to try to concili- 
ate it, but that the best thing to do was to avoid 
seeing too much of it. 

People have spoken at length of her tastes for 
occultism and spiritism, and said that she looked for 
consolation for imaginary woes to the practices of 
turning tables and other rubbish of the same kind. 
Unfortunately this was true to a certain extent, be- 



The Czarina and Society 125 

cause it is a sad fact that the Empress liked to sit 
at tables for hours in the hope that they would 
begin turning, and she firmly believed that peo- 
ple could come back from the other world and 
manifest themselves to their friends. But what is 
not so generally known is that it was the Grand 
Duke Nicholas, the future generalissimo of the 
Russian armies, who first set her to do so. He it 
was who brought to the Palace of Czarskoi Selo a 
man called Philippe, who professed to be a powerful 
medium, and who certainly inspired the Czarina 
with great confidence. For a year or two he re- 
mained in favour, then was dismissed quite sud- 
denly because he had been found out by accident, 
but so completely that even Alexandra Feodorovna 
could not defend him. 

Some people have said that it was not without 
malicious intention that the Grand Duke Nicholas 
introduced this dangerous person to Czarskoi Selo. 
It has been reported that he wanted to bring about 
a scandal to the effect that the Empress should be 
declared, if not quite insane, at least afflicted with 
melancholia, and put under restraint. She was al- 
ready at that time suspected of German leanings 
and sympathies, and supposed to influence her hus- 



126 My Empress 

band in favour of Germany and a German alliance. 
The Grand Duke Nicholas was a strong partisan 
of a close union with France, and of coiu'se he con- 
sidered that my poor mistress was an obstacle to 
his views, so he would have been delighted had any 
circumstance arisen which would have put her 
aside. Certainly he was the means through which 
the Empress acquired her strange tastes for all 
things connected with occultism, and he was also 
the first person to draw the attention of the public 
and of the Imperial family to this peculiarity, and 
to insist on the dangers which it presented. The 
fact was that the Czarina was the only obstacle 
which the Grand Dukes and their party encoun- 
tered in the realisation of their plans to take under 
their protection and to keep in their power the 
weak-minded Nicholas II., who, it was known but 
too well, always adopted the opinion of the last 
person who spoke with him, and was incapable of 
making any decision of his own accord. The Em- 
press, thanks to the fact that she was always with 
him, had the best chance to make herself heard and 
listened to, and consequently she represented a for- 
midable danger to the ambitions of those haughty 
Romanoffs who aspired, if not to dethrone, at least 



The Czarina and Society 127 

to keep in their own hands this feeble nephew, so 
devoid of initiative. 

During the last two or three years which pre- 
ceded the war, these different intrigues had as- 
sumed quite a dangerous character, and when the 
Rasputin incident occurred, they only grew in in- 
tensity. The Empress became the one great 
enemy, to the destruction of whom many applied 
themselves with the more energy that she began to 
do what she had carefully avoided before — to inter- 
est herself in politics, and to study them carefully, 
in view to being able to advise her husband amidst 
the growing difficulties of the international political 
position in general. The Grand Duke Nicholas, 
who headed the faction having for aim the removal 
of Alexandra Feodorovna, spared no means to de- 
stroy her influence, and to ruin her reputation as a 
Sovereign and as a woman. He partly succeeded, 
as we have seen, but at the same time he contributed 
to the fall of his own dynasty, and to the ruin of 
his country. It is a sad but certain fact that the 
Russian Imperial family never understood the 
meaning of the word "solidarity," and perhaps it 
is thanks to this defect of theirs that the head of 



128 My Empress 

the House of Romanoff has been sent into exile 
and his race deprived of the throne which Peter 
the Great and Catherine II. had so gloriously oc- 
cupied. 



CHAPTER XI 

THE CZARINA AND HER MOTHER-IN- 
LAW 

I HAVE heard that many different tales have 
been circulated concerning the relations of my mis- 
tress with the Dowager Empress. It is useless to 
pretend that they were pleasant, but, on the other 
hand, neither of the two ladies gave vent to open 
manifestations of hostility, whatever they may have 
thought in the interior of their hearts. During the 
first months following the marriage of the Czar 
things went smoothly, because it was impossible 
to show more deference to any one than Alexandra 
Feodorovna displayed in regard to her mother-in- 
law. But the latter was still too young to care to 
be suddenly called upon to play second fiddle, and 
she missed the power which she had exercised over 
Alexander III., who used to consult her in regard 
to everything he did. She had had enormous in- 
fluence over him, and, if the truth be told, over the 
whole course of affairs in Russia, but she had ex- 

129 



130 My Empress 

ercised it with such tact, and so secretly, that it 
had never been suspected ; on the contrary, the Em- 
press had been described as a frivolous woman who 
cared only for dress, dances and parties. In re- 
gard to the Consort of Nicholas II. things were very 
different. She arrived in Russia with the reputa- 
tion of being a clever woman, with strong opinions, 
and of course found the public prepared either to 
accept them or else to start up opposition against 
her. German princesses were not liked, and it had 
been hoped that the heir to the throne would avoid 
choosing a wife in a German court. The Dow- 
ager Empress was Danish by birth, a fact that had 
contributed most certainly to the great popularity 
she had immediately acquired. There was a pow- 
erful party behind her, quite ready to back her up 
against her daughter-in-law, and, unfortunately, 
the latter was apprised of it, which had the effect 
of setting her against any advice she received from 
quarters which she suspected of intriguing against 
her. As I have said before, if the Emperor and his 
young bride had been able from the beginning to set 
up an establishment of their own, perhaps things 
would not have fared so badly, and I have often 
wondered why this was not done. With the immense 



Czarina and Mother-in-Law 131 

Winter Palace standing empty, or almost so, it 
would not have been difficult to arrange some apart- 
ments for the newly married pair, until those they 
were to occupy definitely had been got ready. There 
were the rooms which had been occupied by the Em- 
press Marie Alexandrovna, which, with small ex- 
pense, might have been made habitable in a few 
days. They at least would have made a fitting es- 
tablishment for a Sovereign, whilst the two small 
closets (for they can hardly be called anything else) 
which were assigned to Nicholas II. and his wife in 
the ground floor of the Anitschkoff Palace, were so 
inappropriate, so ugly and so uncomfortable that 
it is no wonder the latter felt depressed the whole 
time she was compelled to occupy them. Then, as I 
have said, the servants gossiped, and repeated to the 
Dowager Empress everything that her daughter-in- 
law was doing, a fact of which the latter became 
aware through remarks made to her by the elder 
lady, and the result was most disastrous. The arri- 
val of the children, whose advent obliged Alexandra 
Feodorovna to set up a nursery, which she tried to 
model after those she had seen in England, did not 
improve conditions that already had become 
strained, because, as one daughter after another ap- 



132 My Empress 

peared, Marie Feodorovna grew to think that her 
daughter-in-law would never give an heir to the 
throne and to look up towards her second son 
Michael as the future Emperor. This was gall and 
wormwood to my mistress, who often lamented the 
fact, and, when she had taken me into her confi- 
dence, complained of the want of consideration with 
which her mother-in-law made her feel that she was 
a nobody and had not fulfilled the duty which was 
expected of her, that of providing future Emper- 
ors for Russia. Other reasons also contrived to 
add to this state of latent irritation which had es- 
tablished itself in the bosom of the Imperial fam- 
ily. There was the question of the crown jewels; 
of the order in which the names of the two Em- 
presses were to be introduced into the church lit- 
urgy; and many others, small and great. The 
Dowager was far too tactful to complain about the 
domestic relations of her son, but she contrived to 
let people guess her sentiments on the subject, and 
took to spending more and more of her time in 
Denmark, which after all was perhaps the best 
thing she could have done. 

The Japanese war, however, brought her back 
to Russia, and it was during its course that there 




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Grand Duke MiCHAEii 



Czarina and Mother-in-Law 133 

happened the one great event in the life of Alex- 
andra Feodorovna — the birth of her only son. 

Great were the rejoicings when this small boy 
made his appearance in a world which was not to 
prove too kind to him, as we all know. His ad- 
vent, however, disturbed the equanimity of several 
people, whilst it raised the hopes of others. For 
one thing, the Grand Duke Michael, the only 
brother of the Czar, lost all the importance with 
which he had been endowed in the eyes of the pub- 
lic as the eventual heir to the Russian throne. It 
also took away some of that of his mother, who was 
supposed to exercise considerable control over him, 
and of course the feehngs of the latter on the sub- 
ject were very much mixed, because though on the 
one hand she could not but rejoice at seeing the suc- 
cession secured in the direct line, yet, on the other 
hand, she had accustomed herself, as had many 
others, to the idea that her eldest son would never 
become father to a boy, and it required a certain 
time before she could get accustomed to the changes 
which the birth of the little Alexis had brought 
about. 

Furthermore, the young Empress, feeling at last 
secure of her own position, began to assert herself 



134 My Empress 

far more than she had ever done before, and she 
tried to win for herself partisans. Unfortunately 
she looked for them among people who turned out 
afterwards to be her worst foes, and the liberty 
which she imagined she had acquired to live her 
own life without any regard to the trammels of 
etiquette or other consideration, transformed the 
dislike she had hitherto inspired into something 
very much akin to hatred. 

Her boy proved a delicate child, and when the 
fact became known it awakened the hopes of the 
party antagonistic to Alexandra and raised those 
of the people attached to the fortunes of the Grand 
Duke Michael. His sister-in-law, when she found 
this out (and there were but too many people eager 
to inform her of it) , grew in her turn to dislike the 
Grand Duke, and to think how she could get rid 
of him. According to the family statute of the 
Romanoffs, he would have been Regent of the 
Empire in case the Czar had died before his heir 
had reached his majority, and the Empress, in that 
case, would have been more or less subjected to him 
and to any commands he would have deemed it 
necessary to issue to her. Most likely the first 
thing he would have done would have been to de- 



Czarina and Mother-in-Law 135 

prive her of the custody of her son and to surround 
the latter with men of his own choice. The very 
thought of such a contingency made Alexandra 
Feodorovna wild, so when the Grand Duke con- 
tracted the morganatic marriage which brought 
upon him the wrath of his brother she seized upon 
the occasion to try to get rid once and forever of 
a personage whom she considered her worst enemy. 
If the truth be told, poor Michael had never been 
her enemy, however much he may have disap- 
proved of some of her actions. The only thing he 
asked was to be left alone with the wife whom he 
had chosen and married against the opposition of 
the whole world and of his entire family, beginning 
with his mother. She was a lady by birth, the wife 
of one of his brother officers in a Cuirassier regi- 
ment quartered at Gatchina. The Grand Duke 
had become attracted by her principally on account 
of her sympathetic appearance and the patience 
with which she had listened to the tale of his af- 
fection for one of his sister Olga's maids of hon- 
our with whom he had been passionately in love and 
whom he had wished to marry. The romance was 
quickly nipped in the bud by the interference of 
the Dowager Empress and the young lady packed 



136 My Empress 

away abroad with strict injunctions not to return 
to Russia until further notice. The Grand Duke 
had been very unhappy, but had submitted, and 
poured the story of his wrongs into the ears of 
Madame Wulfert. The latter was a charming 
woman, but she had had a first husband, from whom 
she had been divorced before marrying her pres- 
ent one. This alone would have made her unde- 
sirable as a wife for the only brother of the Czar, 
and when her union with Captain Wulfert was also 
dissolved, thanks to the relations which had es- 
tablished themselves between her and the young 
Grand Duke, this undesirableness was still further 
accentuated. But she had given birth to a son, and 
was moreover a person of considerable attraction 
and of unusual cleverness. Michael found out that 
he could not live without her, and married her in 
Vienna, without asking any one's permission to do 
so, thereby bringing upon his head the wrath of 
all his relatives. 

The Emperor, however, would have felt inclined 
to let the whole matter pass, or at least to make as 
if he ignored it. But neither his mother nor his 
wife would hear of it. The former wished some 
kind of punishment to be inflicted on her rebellious 



Czarina and Mother-in-Law 137 

son, and the latter decided that this punishment 
should be a most rigorous one. She prevailed upon 
the weak-minded Czar to put his brother under re- 
straint and to make him what is called in England 
a ward in chancery, assuming himself his guardian- 
ship and depriving him of the management of the 
large fortune he had inherited from the Czar Alex- 
ander III. This made him of course ineligible as 
a Regent should the Emperor die, and that was 
what the Czarina was aiming at. Of course she 
was wrong, and respectful as I was towards her, I 
could not help one evening, when she had broached 
the subject of her own accord, telling her that I 
thought she had made a great mistake in taking 
such a decided part in the chastisement of her 
brother-in-law, and that it would have been more 
politic on her part to keep outside the matter and 
to allow it to be settled between the Czar and the 
Dowager Empress, who, after all, were the only 
persons concerned in it. My mistress listened in 
silence to my words, then suddenly exclaimed with 
unusual violence: "I had to do it; I had to do it; 
he wanted to part me from my son; he had to be 
put out of the way!" There was nothing to reply 
to this outburst, but I could not help regretting 



138 My Empress 

that the Empress had allowed herself to be influ- 
enced by false reports, and that her common sense 
had not prevailed and stopped her from compro- 
mising herself so openly in this matter. My fore- 
bodings, alas, turned out to have been true ones, 
because the first person who was furious with the 
Czarina for the part she had played in this whole 
story was the Empress Dowager, who had not 
wished things to go so far, and who guessed at 
once the real reasons which had actuated her daugh- 
ter-in-law. The breach between the two ladies was 
in consequence considerably widened, and as my 
mistress grew more and more addicted to those 
superstitious practices which proved her bane, 
Marie Feodorovna found real grounds for criticis- 
ing her, so that it became at last a recognised fact 
that the worst adversary of the Empress was her 
own mother-in-law. 

I am sure that the latter would have felt sorry 
had she known to what extent the strained relations 
which existed between her and her son's wife were 
talked of in public. She possessed far more sense 
of dignity than Alexandra Feodorovna, and had 
moreover been reared in old Imperial traditions un- 
known to her daughter-in-law. But she did not 



Czarina and Mother-in-Law 139 

like her, and on the other hand this sense of dig- 
nity to which I have just alluded suffered in see- 
ing the domestic life of her child, a child who was 
also her Sovereign, turned into ridicule by every- 
body, and causing him to be despised even more 
than disliked. Finding that the war did not allow 
her to go to her beloved Denmark, she finally re- 
tired to KiefF, where the Revolution found her, and 
whence she went to Livadia in the Crimea, where 
she still is to-day. When I think over these things, 
it seems to me that all these frictions, which turned 
out ultimately to have been far more important 
than they appeared at first, might have been avoid- 
ed, at least in part, if the young Empress had re- 
strained herself in the expression of her feelings. 
But she was too frank, too honest, too true, to be 
able to play a comedy, and diplomacy was an art 
utterly unknown to her. She had not been trained 
in dissimulation, and she despised this atmosphere 
of the Court where a curb on one's thoughts and 
words was indispensable. In certain respects she 
was a child, with all a child's impulsiveness and 
beautiful indifference to the judgments and appre- 
ciations of the world, and this innocence of her 
mind and heart made her no match against the in- 



140 My Empress 

trigues that surrounded her. She had no one to 
love her except her children, and a husband who 
was not strong enough to protect her against at- 
tack, and whom in the bottom of her heart she must 
have secretly despised, as indeed he deserved to be, 
because, whilst an amiable and kind man, he was 
not suited for a Sovereign, and could no more con- 
trol his own conduct than he could the destiny of 
the nation over which fate had set him to rule. He 
had absolutely no initiative and no strength of 
character. No efforts of his parents or of his tu- 
tors in his young days had been able to change his 
natural indolence and readiness to accept and to 
endorse as his own the ideas and opinions of every 
one he talked to, even if they differed diametrically 
from those he had himself expressed previously. 



CHAPTER XII 

THE CZARINA'S DAILY OCCUPATIONS 

I HAVE often been asked what the Czarina used 
to do with her days and whether it was true that 
she spent them in absolute idleness. And just as 
often I have wondered what could have given rise 
to such an opinion. The Empress was, on the con- 
trary, one of those industrious women whose hands 
are never at rest, and who require to be always 
occupied in some way or another, either mentally 
or with some manual work which keeps their at- 
tention concentrated on its intricacies. At Darm- 
stadt the Princesses were trained to make their 
own clothes and to wait upon themselves, and one 
of the great pleasures of my mistress was to em- 
broider, cut, and make the different objects com- 
posing the layette and the wardrobe of her children. 
As I have already related, she had tried to arrange 
in Czarskoi Selo a Needlework GuUd, but she did 
not meet with any enthusiastic response to her ef- 
forts in that direction. Nevertheless, until she left 

141 



142 My Empress 

it, there was in the Palace where she had made her 
home a room set apart for the use of the ladies 
who used to come and work on certain days and 
hours on clothes for the poor which were distributed 
to the indigent of Czarskoi Selo and St. Petersburg 
at Christmas time. When the Japanese war oc- 
curred, a regular working room was established in 
the Winter Palace and never closed, because it be- 
came the centre of the Empress's activity in the 
way of making garments for the poor. No Sov- 
ereign had ever thought of anything of the kind in 
Russia, and of course the action of Alexandra Feo- 
dorovna in that respect was discussed far and wide, 
and whilst many people applauded her for the ini- 
tiative she had taken, others thought it was not dig- 
nified for a Russian Empress to cut flannels and 
knit stockings, even for the poor. They would have 
liked her to depend for her charities on other 
people, as her predecessors had done. In fact, in 
this as in so many other things, she was ignoring 
the traditions which governed all that went on in 
the Palaces of the Czars, and of course this was 
resented. But the poor population of the capital 
learnt to bless the Empress's name, and for a time 
was grateful to her, until the days of the first Revo- 



Czarina^s Daily Occupations 143 

lution, when everything that was connected with 
her became tinged with that unpopularity which 
had become attached to her name. 

The Empress was a great reader, but only of se- 
rious books, and scientific ones were her favour- 
ites. She did not care for history, which she frankly 
owned bored her, because she could not interest 
herself in the sayings and doings of people long 
dead. But science held her enthralled, and every 
work which was published in English, French and 
German on astronomy, mathematics, and natural 
history was perused by her with avidity. She ad- 
mired immensely Darwin's "Origin of Species," 
and had one day a furious battle with her Father 
Confessor, who remonstrated with her for keeping 
such a dangerous work in her rooms. Astronomy 
was also one of her hobbies, and she expounded it to 
her children whenever she found an occasion or 
opportunity to do so. 

She embroidered wonderfully, and made some 
church ornaments which would easily have won a 
prize at any exhibition. But her great amusement 
was the drawing of caricatures which she executed 
with an incredible talent, having the knack of 
seizing the funny side of each thing or person 



144 My Empress 

she tried her pencil upon. This talent, how- 
ever, caused her much annoyance, because the 
people whose ridiculous points she seized upon be- 
came aware of it and were deeply offended, as a 
matter of course, especially the members of the 
Imperial family, who, more than any others, had 
the misfortune to fall under her satirical pencil. 
Had she been prudent enough not to show her 
sketches to friends it would not have been so bad, 
but she was, on the contrary, fond of exhibiting 
them, and did so without the least discrimination, 
with the result that she gained for herself the repu- 
tation of being an unkind and malicious woman, 
which was far from the case. The Empress tried to 
develop a love for music in her children, and greatly 
succeeded with her eldest daughter, the Grand 
Duchess Olga, who had a really wonderful talent 
for the piano. She could compose wild, melodious 
airs, imbued with that Russian and Slav sadness 
which is latent in all Northern characters. I re- 
member one day last May when, entering unex- 
pectedly the apartment where the young Grand 
Duchesses were sitting, I was entranced by the 
playing of Olga, who seemed to put into her music 
all the agony and anxiety of her soul. Things were 




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Grand Duchess Olga 



Czarina's Daily Occupations 145 

dark then. The possibility of seeing exchanged the 
prison of Czarskoi Selo for another was abeady 
looming on the horizon, and the young and blooming 
girl who was to be sent to the horrors and soHtude 
of a terrible exile was giving vent to her feelings in 
the weird accents which she gave to the music with 
which she tried to ease her troubled feelings. 

In spite of her taste for music, the Empress 
rarely went to the Opera. She hated showing her- 
self in the big box where etiquette compelled her 
to sit, and she disliked the one that was common to 
all the members of the Imperial family. So that 
even during the early years of her marriage, when 
she used to spend a few weeks each winter in St. 
Petersburg, she rarely showed herself in any thea- 
tre, not even at the French play, which it had been 
almost a matter of obligation, from times imme- 
morial, for the sovereigns to visit every Saturday. 

She had made it a point to study the Russian 
language, but had never really learned to speak it, 
and had never divested herself of a very strong 
German accent that had a harsh sound, which 
added to its general unpleasantness. The Empress 
had not a pleasant nor a harmonious voice, and as 
she was aware of the fact she tried to overcome this 



146 My Empress 

disadvantage by talking in very low tones, so low 
indeed that sometimes it was difficult to hear her. 
She would then get impatient and break off the 
conversation, to the dismay of her interlocutors. 
During the last years she had grown slightly deaf, 
which added to the difficulty. 

Her inability to talk Russian naturally dis- 
pleased people, but I have always wondered why 
she was so sharply taken to account for it, consid- 
ering the fact that her mother-in-law had never 
learnt it either, which had not prevented her from 
becoming popular. It was again a case of "give 
a dog a bad name and hang him." 

The Empress kept up a vast correspondence 
with her relatives all over Europe. In England, 
where she had been brought up, she had also friends 
with whom she liked to exchange her impressions 
and thoughts, and to her brother she wrote daily. 
She had a very distinct handwriting, plain and leg- 
ible, and her signature was exceptionally large. 
lExcept in official documents she always used the 
name "Alix," instead of Alexandra, and the Em- 
peror in the privacy of their family life called her 
r*Alice." She generally occupied herself with her 
correspondence in the afternoon after her daily 



Czarina's Daily Occupations 147 

walk with the Emperor, and as soon as her cup of 
tea was brought to her at five o'clock she stopped 
writing, even if she was in the midst of a letter. 
In that respect she was quite extraordinary. 
Things had to be done at a certain hour, and if not, 
had to be put oif until the next day. She would not 
for anything in the world have sacrificed five min- 
utes of the time appointed for something else to 
finish what she was doing at the moment. 

In Czarskoi Selo she had a lovely room full of 
flowers where she had her writing table, a wonder- 
ful specimen of French art of the time of Louis 
XV. Next to it stood a smaller table, where she 
used to throw the sheets she had just finished writ- 
ing upon, until all her letters were finished, when 
she would pick them up and put them in their en- 
velopes. This led her sometimes to mix up one 
letter with another, and brought her into trouble 
through people getting missives which were not 
meant for them. While Queen Victoria was alive 
the Empress wrote to her regularly every week, 
but she did not much care for so doing, and used 
to say that it was a duty she would rather not have 
had imposed upon her. At Christmas and the New 
Year, she regularly sent her best wishes to the 



148 My Empress 

other European sovereigns whom she knew per- 
sonally. 

In this room I have just described, which was 
hung up with light and bright chintz, reminding 
one of an English room, and which contained com- 
fortable and at the same time costly furniture, the 
Empress transacted only her private correspond- 
ence. All her official writing was done in a small 
library opening out of her sitting room, where stood 
a large, ugly and practical writing table with in- 
numerable pigeonholes, at which she used to sit 
when her private secretary presented to her his 
daily reports. It was at this table she made up 
her accounts and attended to all her business, and 
it was also here that she made out the programme 
for her public work, receptions, visits to charitable 
institutions, and so forth. She was most orderly 
and neat in her habits, and could tell at once where 
she had put such or such a paper. I do not think 
that she could have tolerated disorder in any shape 
or form around her, and she used to go through 
her numerous drawers and wardrobes every month, 
when she expected to find every single thing in the 
place where she had ordered it to be put. All her 
laces, of which she had a wonderful collection, were 



Czarina's Daily Occupations 149 

kept in a separate cupboard, of which I was the 
only person to have a key. The Empress herself 
possessed a duplicate one, as she did of all her 
trunks, wardrobes, and cupboards, and she clung 
to them like a real German housewife, and some- 
times would unexpectedly open one or the other of 
these receptacles to assure herself that they were 
kept in order. I remember an amusing instance of 
this mania. When the Empress married, she re- 
ceived among her wedding presents a beautiful 
writing table set in crystal and gold with her mono- 
gram and the Russian Eagle on the top of the 
inkstand. For some years she always used it, until 
at last one day the Emperor noticed that there was 
some inaccuracy in the coat of arms of the Roman- 
offs which was ornamenting the blotting book, and 
he instantly presented his wife with another and 
far handsomer writing table set, a masterpiece of 
the skill of Faberge, the great Court jeweller in 
St. Petersburg, which was made out of platinum 
and crystal, with big turquoises as ornaments. The 
pen was of solid gold and had a turquoise as a finish 
to the handle. Of course the Empress hastened to 
put away the old set which had displeased her 
spouse, and we stored it up in one of the cupboards 



ISO My Empress 

in which were kept the innumerable possessions of 
the Czarina. One day she opened the said cup- 
board when no one else was present and was highly 
displeased to find that some parts of this writing 
table set were put on a different shelf from the 
others. This had been done because we had thought 
that it would suit better the amount of room which 
we had at our disposal, but the Empress would not 
enter into considerations of that kind, and gave 
us a good scolding for keeping her things "in such 
disorder," as she expressed it. 

Twice a year she went over her whole wardrobe, 
at the time when she ordered the new dresses which 
she required for each season. She then looked over 
the different articles in it with care, and either made 
a present of the things which she thought she would 
not want any longer, or sent them to her sister the 
Grand Duchess Elizabeth in Moscow, where the 
latter disposed of them among the poor girls of the 
Moscow nobility about to be married. She would 
be very careful to have every bit of real lace un- 
picked from these dresses, and then this lace was 
consigned to the cupboard set apart for that pur- 
pose, and entered in a catalogue, which was en- 
tirely written in the Empress's own hand. 



Czarina's Daily Occupations 151 

As may be imagined, all this kept my mistress 
busy; and indeed there was hardly one hour in the 
day when she was not occupied with one thing or 
another. Her children's wardrobes were looked 
after by her with the same care that she applied to 
her own thiiigs. And at Czarskoi Selo and Liva- 
dia she herself used to look over the housekeeping 
books of the Imperial household, much to the dis- 
may of the head of it, who often complained that 
the Empress did not in the least understand the 
intricacies of the management which she sometimes 
so freely criticised. But though she frankly owned 
that she did not know how much an egg or a potato 
cost, yet, as she declared, she liked to be aware of 
the price of the potatoes which she consumed. It 
was an innocent mania, and would have been con- 
sidered as such if there had not existed malicious 
people ready to make fun of it, and to laugh at the 
"German Housekeeper," as they derisively called 
my poor mistress, who in view of this fact would 
have done much better not to have meddled in mat- 
ters in which after all she had no need to enter, and 
which so many people would have been but too 
happy not to have to think about. 



CHAPTER XIII 

THE JAPANESE WAR AND THE BIRTH 
OF THE CZAREVITSCH 

The first really great sorrow and anxiety which 
fell on my beloved mistress was the Japanese war. 
I am not writing here a political book, and indeed 
understand nothing about politics, but what I do 
know is that no one could have been more affected 
by the disasters which destroyed the Russian army 
and fleet than was the Empregs. She used to 
spend hours weeping in her room, where she al- 
lowed no one, not even her children, to enter, and 
it was from that time that dated the terrible head- 
aches which later on were to prostrate her so ut- 
terly. She was then in a delicate state of health, 
and the Emperor wanted to spare her as much as 
possible the news which was brought of one sad 
event after another concerning all that went on in 
this distant Manchuria, where Russian soldiers 
were fighting such a hard battle. The whole coun- 
try was exasperated at the lamentable organisa- 

152 



The Japanese War 153 

tion, or rather want of organisation, which was re- 
vealed so unexpectedly, and it was dating from 
Mukden and Tsushima that the Revolutionary- 
elements in the country raised their heads and be- 
gan to threaten the throne which they were to de- 
stroy twelve years later. The whole of Russia was 
in the throes of an insurrectional movement, and 
perhaps the only persons who were not aware of 
its strength and magnitude were the sovereigns 
themselves. Nicholas II. had not realised the 
possibility of the fall of his dynasty and seriously 
believed that he could stop the torrent that was 
flooding the country. The Empress was ignorant 
of the details of the convulsions which were fast 
destroying the old legends and traditions which had 
presided at the government of the Empire for such 
a long time. She had a few illusions left still, and 
one of them was in regard to the strength and the 
spirit of devotion of the army. It was therefore a 
terrible shock to her to find that this army which 
she had believed to be invincible had allowed itself 
to be beaten by the troops of the Mikado whom 
she had regarded as savages. She felt cruelly the 
loss of prestige which this disastrous campaign en- 
tailed, and she also felt humiliated in her pride 



154 My Empress 

as a Sovereign and as a woman. Added to this 
weight of anxieties was another — ^the dread that 
the child whose birth she was expecting would 
prove another daughter, whose advent into the 
world would add to the unpopularity of its mother. 
Sometimes my heart used to ache for her, when I 
saw her dragging herself through the park of Pe- 
terhof, looking so ill ihat one wondered whether 
she would be able to stand the trial which was 
awaiting her. In her cruel anxiety she found no 
one to encourage her or to whisper words of en- 
couragement in her ear. Her husband was him- 
self absorbed by the saddest of preoccupations and 
she did not care to add to them by speaking to him 
of her own personal griefs and sorrows. So the 
time went on, bringing every day new subjects for 
alarm, and new causes for discouragement. At 
last one morning I was called to the bedside of the 
Empress, together with all her other attendants, 
and with trembling hearts we awaited the verdict 
of the doctors as to her safety and the sex of the 
infant for whose advent we were watching with 
such intense interest. It was noon, and the great 
clock of the castle of Peterhof had just been heard 
striking the twelve strokes announcing it, when a 



The Japanese War 155 

child's cry broke the silence of the room where the 
Empress was lying, and then Doctor Ott, her phy- 
sician, turned towards the Czar, standing pale and 
worried beside his Consort, with the word: "I con- 
gratulate Your Majesty on the birth of a Czare- 
vitsch." 

Nicholas II. did not reply. He stood as if dazed 
by the unexpected news. No one spoke or inter- 
rupted his meditation, but all devoted themselves 
to the Empress, who was still under the effects of 
the chloroform that had been administered to her. 
When she opened her eyes she looked so weak that 
no one dared to tell her the good news, but she 
seemed to read it in the face of her husband, because 
she suddenly exclaimed: "Oh, it cannot be true; it 
cannot be true. Is it really a boy?" 

Nicholas II. fell on his knees beside her and 
burst into tears, the first and only ones I had ever 
seen him shed. 

The birth of an heir to the throne was an event 
of such magnitude that it absorbed for some time 
the whole attention of the public, and diverted it 
from all that was taking place in the Far East. 
For his parents it came as a consolation after long 
years of waiting, and seemed to have been destined 



156 My Empress 

to comfort them for the disasters which were tak- 
ing place at the front. The Czar could not re- 
strain his joy, and at every moment he used to 
speak of "his son," and to look out for occasions to 
pronounce the magic words, "My Boy." The Em- 
press's happiness was less buoyant but just as in- 
tense, perhaps even more so, for this opportune 
arrival of the little man whom one had already left 
off expecting improved considerably her own po- 
sition, and gave her an importance which had been 
denied to her before. She became passionately at- 
tached to this child of promise, and almost painfully 
and morbidly devoted to him. Unfortunately he 
proved a most delicate little mortal, and for the 
first years that followed upon his birth the doctors 
who attended him hardly hoped they would be able 
to save his life. He was bom with an organic dis- 
ease, or rather defect, a weakness of the blood ves- 
sels which ruptured on the slightest provocation, 
causing hemorrhages that sometimes could not 
be stopped for hours. For a long time his condi- 
tion was hidden from the public, but at last con- 
cealment became impossible, especially after an at- 
tack which occurred about two years before the 
great war, which was of so serious a nature that the 




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The ex-Czarevitch 



The Japanese War 157 

child's life was absolutely despaired of. A few 
months before this he had been obliged to undergo 
an operation for hernia and had hardly recovered 
from the effects of it when an accident brought 
about the hemhorrhage which for weeks resisted 
every remedy employed to stop it. These were 
anxious times for the parents, and the Empress's 
hair changed colour and showed streaks of grey be- 
fore her son was at last pronounced out of danger. 

I have spoken at length of this serious illness of 
the little Alexis because so many ridiculous tales 
were put into circulation concerning it, tales which 
were as malicious as they were foundationless. 
The small heir of Nicholas II. was never the ob- 
ject of any attack of nihilists, and all the detailed 
circumstances which some newspapers related con- 
cerning him were all of them pure invention. It 
is sufficient to say that when he became ill the Im- 
perial family were not on their yacht, but were 
staying at one of the Czar's shooting boxes at Spala 
in Poland. I have often wondered who could have 
had an interest in giving publicity to the ridiculous 
and distressing tale which is to this day firmly be- 
lieved by many people outside of Russia. 

When the Grand Duke was able to be moved his 



158 My Empress 

parents returned to Czarskoi Selo, whence they 
went for many months to the Crimea, the mild cli- 
mate of which was considered to be necessary for 
his convalescence. But for more than two years 
after this attack the boy was not allowed to walk, 
and was constantly carried about in the arms of 
a sailor from the Imperial yacht whom he had taken 
into his affection, and who to this day is with him, 
having chosen to accompany him to Siberia. This 
necessity of having to exhibit, so to say, a sick 
child, was most painful to the feelings of the Em- 
press, whose maternal pride was hurt by the knowl- 
edge that the whole of Russia was commenting on 
it and pitying the Emperor for having an heir in 
such a sad state of health. She was also continu- 
ally subjected to the railleries of her husband's fam- 
ily that reproached her for having, as one of the 
Grand Duchesses once expressed it, "contaminat- 
ed the Romanoffs with the diseases of her own 
race." There was some truth in the accusation, be- 
cause the illness from which the boy suffered was 
hereditary in the Saxe-Coburg family, and had been 
brought into the House of Hesse by the Princess 
Alice, the mother of the Empress, whose own 
brother, the Duke of Albany, had died from the 



The Japanese War 159 

effects of it at Cannes. The worst thing about it 
was that one could never know when it was going 
to break out afresh. The slightest knock was suf- 
ficient to bring on an attack, and one can imagine 
how far from easy it was to watch over every move- 
ment of a lively boy full of fun and high spirited, 
such as Alexis proved to be. On the other hand 
this physical infirmity ( for it could hardly be called 
anything else) had this result that the child got to 
be inordinately spoiled. The mother was afraid to 
contradict him or to refuse to submit to any of his 
caprices, because she had been told that it was dan- 
gerous for him even to cryi, as any exertion of his 
lungs or throat might bring about the rupture of 
some blood vessel. One may therefore form an 
idea of the system of education to which Alexis was 
subjected, and perhaps one will feel indulgent in 
regard to the Empress when thinking of the per- 
petual dread and anxiety in which her days and 
nights were spent, and forgive her for the weak- 
ness which made her yield to every whim or ca- 
price of the boy who seemed to have been born 
to add to her cup of sorrow, and not for the pur- 
pose of bringing joy into her life. 

I will now relate an incident which deeply im- 



i6o My Empress 

pressed the Czarina at the time when it occurred. 
It was a few days before the birth of her son. We 
were at Peterhof and she was dressing for dinner. 
Suddenly we heard a crash behind us, and were 
dismayed to see that a heavy looking glass which 
hung upon the wall behind Alexandra Feodorovna 
had fallen to the floor, where it had been shattered 
into a thousand fragments. The Empress cried 
aloud in her emotion, and for one moment I be- 
lieved that she was about to faint, so white did her 
features become. I applied myself to reassure her, 
but she would not be comforted, and declared that 
it was an ill omen and that probably she would die 
in childbirth. When everything was over, and on 
the day of the christening of the Grand Duke 
Alexis, I ventured to remind his mother of her 
fright of a few weeks before, and added that it was 
a clear proof how wrong it was to be superstitious, 
because certainly nothing happier could have oc- 
curred than the event which had just taken place, 
notwithstanding the bad omen of the broken look- 
ing glass. The Empress smiled sadly, and replied : 
"My good Mar fa, we do not know yet what is go- 
ing to befall my baby, and whether his will be a 



The Japanese War i6i 

happy life or not. Perhaps the bad omen was for 
him and not for me." 

A curious thing is that exactly ten years later, 
in July, 1914, just before the war, we were again 
at Peterhof, and the Czarina was dressing for din- 
ner in the same room, when that identical looking 
glass, which had been rehung, fell with the same 
noise and just as unexpectedly, terrifying her as it 
had done before. Alas, alas, we could afford then 
to laugh at omens, but now that so many tragic 
things have occurred I wonder sometimes whether 
these accidents (for one can hardly call them any- 
thing else) were a kind of warning of the calami- 
ties about to foUow. Certainly they could not fail 
to impress a woman as superstitious as the Empress 
grew in time to be. 

When I say "grew," it is not quite exact. She 
had always believed in good and bad omens, and 
she had brought with her from her German home a 
quantity of beliefs in all kinds of uncanny things. 
She would not have sat down thirteen at dinner for 
anything, and the sight of three candles on a table 
made her frantic. She would not have put on a 
green dress for fear it would bring her bad luck, 
and she was always careful to look at a new moon 



i62 My Empress 

from the right side. She never began anything on 
a Friday, and she was firmly convinced that one 
could, if only one were strong enough as a medium, 
summon people from another world into one's pres- 
ence. She believed also in miracles, and would 
worship any dirty relic which hundreds of un- 
washed peasants had kissed, without feeling the 
least disgust, which was the more strange in that 
generally she was almost meticulously careful not 
to touch anything that had not been thoroughly 
cleansed. The influence which Rasputin grew to ac- 
quire over her mind proceeded only from this weak- 
ness of hers, which was continually fomented and 
encouraged by her sister, the Grand Duchess Eliza- 
beth, herself a most devout person who combined 
bigotry with an utter unscrupulousness as to the 
means with which she could realise the many ambi- 
tions that she entertained. 

If the Emperor had been a man of strong char- 
acter he might have prevented his young wife from 
falling under the influence of the many people who 
merely used her as a pawn in their game. But in 
his way he was just as superstitious as she, and 
they both were so absorbed by their love and anx- 
iety for their only son, that they clung to all those 



The Japanese War 163 

whom they thought could be of use to him. Thus 
when they saw Rasputin, whom they considered 
to be a saint, prostrate himself on the ground and 
implore the Almighty to cure the boy, and when 
after this they noticed that the boy was getting 
stronger, they felt more and more tempted to think 
that it was not the doctors (who had told them that 
the child could never be permanently cured) who 
had made him better, but the will of the Almighty, 
and that it was to the Almighty alone they had to 
look for the conservation of the life of that much 
cherished son. 



CHAPTER XIV 

THE CZARINA, HER CHILDREN AND 
HER CHARITIES 

It would be difficult to find a better mother than 
the Empress Alexandra. She entered into the 
smallest details of the training of her daughters 
and her son, and she tried before everything else 
to imbue them with the same serious points of 
view with which she looked upon life and its nu- 
merous duties. She insisted on her children always 
speaking the truth, and the only time I ever saw 
her really angry with the little Alexis was one 
morning when he was caught by her telling a 
falsehood. She had suffered so much through the 
insincerity which continually dogged her footsteps 
that she made up her mind to save her children 
from this misery, and she applied herself to 
make out of them sincere people. She had been 
very lucky in the choice of the lady who was ap- 
pointed to superintend the education of the young 
Grand Duchesses. Mademoiselle ToutschefF was 

164 



Czarina, Children and Charities 165 

a person of the highest moral character, who gave 
herself up to her duties of governess to the daugh- 
ters of Nicholas II. with a complete devotion. 
People said that she had been the whole time in 
variance with the Empress, and that she had left 
at last because her advice had been disregarded. 
But this was not quite correct. It is true that she 
objected to the introduction of Rasputin to her pu- 
pils, but that was principally because she feared the 
influence which this illiterate peasant might come 
to exercise over the impressionable minds of the 
young girls entrusted to her care, whom she did not 
wish to see afflicted with the superstitious religious 
exaggerations to which their mother unfortunately 
succumbed. This led to friction between her and 
Alexandra Feodorovna, and she preferred to resign 
her functions rather than to remain at her post 
after having lost the confidence of the mother of 
her pupils. There may also have been another rea- 
son for her going. The Grand Duchess Olga was 
already twenty years of age, and she had developed 
an independent character which had made the po- 
sition of Mademoiselle Toutscheff extremely dif- 
ficult. She thought that it would be to the advan- 
tage of everybody if she severed her connection with 



1 66 My Empress 

the Imperial family before she had spoilt it by un- 
seemly quarrels. 

In a certain sense she was right, because it was 
unfortunately an undoubted fact that the Empress 
had become quite fanatical in her allegiance to the 
Greek Orthodox Church, and that she tried to in- 
duce her daughters to follow her example. Hap- 
pily for them the girls had a great deal of common 
sense, and they managed to keep themselves free 
from the religious excesses into which their mother 
had fallen. They loved her tenderly, and would 
have given their life for her, and she on her side 
doted on these girls. .When they were babies she 
spent most of her spare time with them in their 
nursery or schoolroom, and later on she shared 
with them all her occupations and associated them 
with her life as much as she could. She never 
parted from them or from their brother, and there 
was not a thing which concerned their well-being, 
down to the smallest details, into which she did not 
enter. When the war broke out she with her two 
eldest daughters followed a course of training as 
sisters of charity, and in the hospital which she 
opened in Czarskoi Selo she nursed the wounded 
soldiers with them. 



Czarina, Children and Charities 167 

In regard to the little boy whose advent had been 
such a source of joy to his parents, the Empress 
was also full of solicitude. She had taken upon 
herself his religious training, and every morning 
had him brought to her room for an hour, when she 
would read to him the gospel and teach him the 
catechism. She was a fond, but by no means a 
foolish mother, and what she aspired after was to 
make out of her children honest men and women 
and worthy members of society. But at the same 
time she had very determined opinions in the mat- 
ter of education, and there were things which she 
could not understand, as, for instance, the necessity 
for her girls to have some amusements in their lives. 
She imagined that it was quite enough for them to 
live with their parents, in possession of all that 
their hearts could desire in the matter of material 
satisfactions, and would not hear of the necessity 
of marriage for them. She could not bring herself 
to look upon them as upon grown-up women, and 
considered them always in the light of babies in 
need of her care. She is not the only mother who 
may be reproached for this failing, and she was 
more reproached for it than she deserved to be. 

The little Grand Duke Alexis had a tutor, an 



i68 My Empress 

Englishman, whom he liked very much, and also a 
French master. His mother wanted him to have a 
complete command of foreign languages, knowing 
by experience how difficult it is for people placed 
in high positions to get on without it. The boy was 
a bright and intelligent child, and if he had only 
had good health, he might have made greater prog- 
ress in his studies. But half of his time was spent 
in bed, and naturally this interfered with the course 
of his lessons. His sisters also were not in posses- 
sion of the best of health, and this extreme delicacy 
of her children was a source of perpetual anxiety 
to the Czarina. She also objected to what she de- 
clared was a tendency towards frivolity on the part 
of her girls. Tatiana especially was extremely fond 
of nice clothes and of jewellery, and her mother 
was continually trying to subdue her extravagances 
in that direction, notwithstanding the fact that she 
very well knew the like reproach might be applied 
to her own self. She was continually drawing the 
attention of her daughters towards the sufferings 
of others, and her instructions bore fruit, because 
when the war broke out the Grand Duchesses dis- 
played wonderful qualities of self-abnegation and 
devotion to the cause of suffering humanity. Ta- 




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The ex-Czarina and Her Son 



Czarina, Children and Charities 169 

tiana in particular was quite marvellous, and 
worked indefatigably in the relief committee at 
the head of which she stood, which proved the only- 
one that did any good, and where malversations did 
not take place. She renounced any pleasures she 
might have obtained in the way of buying this or 
that thing that attracted her fancy, and at last 
when money became scarce she sold a beautiful pearl 
necklace which her father had given to her on her 
eighteenth birthday, to relieve some of the distress 
which was being constantly brought before her no- 
tice. The lessons of her mother had borne fruit. 

The Czarina was naturally extremely charitable, 
and moreover she had very sane ideas in regard to 
the relief of suffering and misery. She had es- 
pecially at heart the fate of small children, and the 
society which she and the Emperor founded, which 
was destined to encourage poor women in their 
aspirations after maternity by teaching them how 
to take care of their offspring, was an elaborate 
and most intelligent affair. She would certainly 
have brought it to an excellent result if the Revo- 
lution had not interfered and destroyed her plans 
in that respect, as it destroyed so many other things. 

My mistress has been reproached at different 



170 My Empress 

times for having shown herself indifferent to the 
cause of national education, and for not having con- 
sidered that problem with the attention it deserved. 
But this was also an unreasonable reproach. The 
Empress could not, even if she had so wished, have 
interfered with the conduct of the different educa- 
tional establishments for women in the Empire. 
These were all of them placed under the patronage 
of the Empress Dowager, who was far too jealous 
of her privileges in that respect to have consented 
to share them with her daughter-in-law. The same 
thing might have been said in regard to the work 
of the Red Cross, which was entirely controlled 
by Marie Feodorovna, who brought to it great 
knowledge and considerable ability. But at the 
same time she would not allow the young Czar- 
ina to interfere with it, and when the latter tried 
in her various visits to the Front to suggest this or 
that improvement in the management of the dif- 
ferent hospitals she inspected, her mother-in-law 
instantly protested and declared herself affronted 
by what she considered to be a criticism on her man- 
agement. The young Empress had to devote her- 
self to the care of the wounded in the different hos- 
pitals which she had organised at Czarskoi Selo, 



Czarina, Children and Charities 171 

and her work remained confined to the great com- 
mittee for rehef of the refugees from the invaded 
countries and other victims of the war, which the 
Emperor had founded at the beginning of the 
campaign, and the care and patronage of which he 
had placed under the management of his wife. It 
was an interesting but at the same time a most 
disheartening work, because it was impossible to 
follow its execution, and one had perforce to de- 
pend on people more or less reliable. My mistress 
often regretted that she was debarred from putting 
her experience and her great love for her neighbour 
at the service of the army. This, however, was 
denied her, perhaps not without reason, because by 
that time she had already become most unpopular 
among the troops, who had taken to calling her "the 
German." One day when she was inspecting a 
field ambulance, she heard the expression in ref- 
erence to herself and was so overcome by it that 
she could not restrain her tears. The poor woman, 
though she knew that she was regarded with any- 
thing but afi*ection by her husband's subjects, yet 
had believed that the army at least appreciated her 
care and her desire for its welfare. The discovery 
that such was far from being the case was a great 



172 My Empress 

blow to her. As time went on, carrying away with it 
all her hopes of winning the love of the Russian 
nation, she became hardened and ceased to conceal 
the contempt which she felt for a world that had 
failed to realise and to believe in her good inten- 
tions. But through it all she applied herself to 
hide from her children the intensity of her disillu- 
sions, and she went on instilling into them those 
high principles to which she had tried to remain 
faithful herself. Her great misfortune was that 
she lived in great times, and that she had no great- 
ness in her to meet them. This was a calamity, but 
by no means caused by her own fault. 

Sometimes she was touching in the attention she 
gave to the smallest detail connected with the train- 
ing and the welfare of her children. One may say 
that even before the great catastrophe which fell 
upon her, her attention had been entirely concen- 
trated on her babes. She liked to be present at all 
the daily routine of their existences, and whenever 
her daughters were to be produced before some of 
their relatives, she made it a point to superintend 
their toilet, and to brush their long hair. The girls 
were generally dressed in white, winter and sum- 
mer, and it was only when they had reached their 



Czarina, Children and Charities 173 

twelfth year that she consented to dress them in 
dark colours during their school hours. But even 
then they had to change for dinner and to appear 
before their parents in the light gowns their mother 
was so fond of. Their clothes were always made in 
the best houses, and their linen just as dainty and 
magnificent as their mother's. In summer and on 
board the Imperial yacht, they were generally at- 
tired in sailor hats and blouses, and were allowed 
to run about as much as they liked, and to talk to 
the officers and sailors. They shared their moth- 
er's love for the sea, and the six weeks or so that 
these annual excursions in the Finnish waters lasted 
were the real holidays of the children as well as of 
the Empress. 

The latter has also been accused of not showing 
any amiability in regard to the foreign guests who 
from time to time visited the Court of Czarskoi 
Selo. In this there may have been a certain amount 
of truth, but the apparent coldness of the young 
Czarina proceeded from the everlasting fear which 
haunted her that she might be compromised by 
showing herself too effusive towards strangers. 
She knew that any attention she showed to her 
visitors would be widely commented upon, and as 



174 My Empress 

these with few exceptions were German princes, 
this circumstance added to her embarrassment, be- 
cause she was very well aware that she was sup- 
posed to harbour strong Teuton sympathies. In 
regard to her English relatives she was handi- 
capped, because the Queen of Great Britain was 
the sister of the Empress Dowager, and when she 
came to Rewal with King Edward, she was natu- 
rally more with Marie Feodorovna than with the 
niece with whom she had so very little in common, 
and who had done nothing whatever to win her sym- 
pathies. 

From time to time the sister of the Czarina, 
Princess Henry of Prussia, put in an appearance 
at Czarskoi Selo, and her brother, the Grand Duke 
of Hesse, was also a frequent visitor there. But 
these visits were never official ones, and mostly 
passed unnoticed by the general public that had 
left off troubling about what went on in the home 
of the Sovereign. The members of the Imperial 
family were also rare visitors at Czarskoi Selo, and 
avoided putting in an appearance there unless 
absolutely compelled to do so. Alexandra Feodor- 
ovna knew so perfectly well how to convey to her 
guests the knowledge that they bored her that it 



Czarina, Children and Charities 175 

was no wonder they did not care to court this knowl- 
edge and that they preferred not to annoy her with 
their presence. The Empress Dowager used to ap- 
pear on the family anniversaries, such as birthdays, 
name days, and others of the kind to offer her con- 
gratulations to her son and daughter-in-law, and 
every winter the young Czarina used to come to 
St. Petersburg from Czarskoi Selo to pay her 
mother-in-law one solemn visit of ceremony; after 
which the two ladies did not see each other for a 
long time. All this was abnormal, but once these 
relations had been established it was next to im- 
possible to change them, and so the breach which 
separated my mistress from the world as well as 
from her husband's family widened and widened, 
until at last she found herself alone in presence of 
danger, of sorrow, and of one of the greatest catas- 
trophes which history will ever record. Whether 
the fault was wholly hers or was shared by others, 
is a point upon which I shall not attempt to give an 
opinion. 



CHAPTER XV 

THE FIRST REVOLUTION 

I OFTEN wondered whether the Empress had 
quite appreciated the magnitude of the first revolu- 
tionary movement which took place in Russia dur- 
ing and after the Japanese war. She had been re- 
peatedly told that it was a mutiny of no impor- 
tance, bound to be crushed by the government. The 
Czar as well as his ministers had purposely left 
her in the dark, the former because he did not wish 
to alarm her, and the latter because they feared 
that she might try, in presence of the danger which 
threatened the dynasty, to persuade her husband to 
adopt a more liberal form of administration, and to 
grant to Russia this Constitution for which every- 
body was clamouring, especially after the war had 
plainly proved that the autocratic regime was at 
an end. She could, however, sometimes hear echoes 
of the general dissatisfaction, and indeed the first 
person who pointed out to ker its extent was the 
Empress Dowager, who knew very well all that was 

176 



The First Revolution 177 

going on, and who had made it a point to become 
as well-informed as possible of all that was taking 
place in the Empire. For once Marie Feodorovna 
appealed to her daughter-in-law to open the eyes 
of Nicholas II. as to the perils of the poHtical situ- 
ation, but she refused to do so, thinking that the 
request covered an intrigue of which she was to 
become the victim. And so time went on until 
Count Witte, who still enjoyed some popularity, 
spoke to the Emperor, and persuaded him to pro- 
mulgate the famous Manifesto of the 17th Oc- 
tober, and to call together a Representative As- 
sembly. In a certain sense this was a victory for 
the Empress, for she had at that period more than 
once expressed her conviction that it would be to 
the advantage of the Russian nation to establish 
a constitutional form of government, as near as 
possible to the one which had proved so successful 
in England. But strange as it may appear to say 
so, she was at that very moment changing her opin- 
ions and rallying to those of the people who thought 
that every concession to the demands of the popu- 
lace would bring about the ruin of the monarchy, 
just as the calling together of the States General in 
France in 1789 had brought about the fall of the 



178 My Empress 

Bourbons and sent Louis XVI. finally to the scaf- 
fold. She had always compared her fate to that 
of Marie Antoinette, and had more than once ex- 
pressed to her friends her conviction that she also 
was destined for some horrible fate. On the day 
when the first Duma was opened by the Emperor 
in the big ballroom of the Winter Palace, she cried 
the whole time that she was dressing, and it was 
almost with a feeling of horror that she allowed her 
maids to place on her head the big diadem of dia- 
monds which formed part of the Crown jewels, 
and to hang about her neck the many rows of 
pearls and precious stones which lay in readiness 
for her. She was dreading the future and wonder- 
ing what it would bring with it. 

There is one incident concerning these momen- 
tous days which I must relate. When the popula- 
tion of St. Petersburg, headed by the notorious 
Gapone, repaired to the Winter Palace and asked 
to see the Sovereign, in order to lay their grievances 
before him, the Czarina was of the opinion that he 
ought to have received them and spoken with them. 
Her mother-in-law thought the same thing. But 
the ministers, and especially Count, then still Ba- 
ron, Fredericks opposed it, and it was their advice 



The First Revolution 179 

which prevailed, instead of that of the two Em- 
presses. To tell the truth, Nicholas was not of a 
courageous nature, and but too ready to listen to 
those who told him that he ought not to expose his 
person to any danger. 

But in presence of this new load of calamity that 
threatened her and her children my mistress more 
than ever put her trust in God, and prayed, prayed 
with more fervour than she had ever done before. 
Several times she interceded in favour of revolu- 
tionaries who had been sentenced to death for some 
political crime or other. This happened particu- 
larly in the case of a woman, Sophy Konopliani- 
nova, who had murdered General Minn, the com- 
mander of the Semenovsky regiment, who had re- 
pressed with ruthless cruelty the Moscow Rebel- 
lion. The Empress wished to have her pardoned, 
but the Czar would not listen to her, and all her 
pleadings for mercy were in vain. 

Is it to be wondered that racked as she was with 
cruel anxieties, and bred in an atmosphere of su- 
perstition, she set her belief more than ever in 
spiritism and consulted fortunetellers, and monks 
and priests who predicted to her a future devoid 
of cares, and one where worries would be unknown 



i8o My Empress 

to her? She listened to them, and with a blind faith 
in their many and varied predictions she proceeded 
to absorb herself more and more in practices of a 
religious devotion which finally mastered all her 
thoughts and left no room in them for anything 
else. She had fitted up in her bedroom an oratory 
full of sacred images, to which every day was added 
another icon. 'No Russian was ever a firmer be- 
liever in the different dogmas of the Orthodox 
Church than was this daughter of a German house, 
whose mother had been an intimate friend of the 
famous Strauss, and had allowed the latter to dedi- 
cate to her his life of Jesus which had caused such 
a profound sensation in literary, religious and phil- 
osophical circles all over the world. 

The Revolution was finally mastered, and though 
the Duma always continued to show itself criticis- 
ing and even rebellious, things began to settle 
down. Russia prepared to celebrate the anniver- 
sary of the Three Hundredth Year of the acces- 
sion of the Romanoff dynasty to the throne, and 
great rejoicings were planned for the occasion. 
The Imperial family came to St. Petersburg for 
the first time since the Japanese war, and remained 
in the capital for four days. A solemn service of 



The First Revolution i8i 

thanksgiving was celebrated in the Kazan Cathe- 
dral, to which representatives of all the classes of the 
Empire were invited, and the nobility of St. Peters- 
burg gave a big ball at which the whole Imperial 
family was present. I remember it so well, be- 
cause it was the last occasion on which the Empress 
appeared in full state and wore the Crown Jewels. 
She had chosen a white satin dress all embroidered 
in silver, and had consented to put on what she did 
but rarely — ^the famous necklace of diamonds to- 
gether with the tiara that had belonged to the Em- 
press Catherine. She was still beautiful, but the 
slight figure that had been so conspicious in her 
young days, and the beautiful complexion which 
had been unrivalled, had disappeared. She looked 
a middle aged, haggard woman, racked with cares 
and anxieties, and though the splendid, sharp pro- 
£Qe could never change, the mouth had altered, and 
its expression was almost tragic. She only re- 
mained for an hour at the ball, and retired before 
supper, leaving her daughters to the care of the 
Dowager Empress, who declared herself delighted 
at the thought of chaperoning them. 

It was the girls' first appearance in society, and 
those who saw them then will never forget how 



i82 My Empress 

they looked. They were both dressed in pink, soft 
clouds of tulle, which suited them to perfection. 
Not regularly pretty, they had sweet faces, and 
such charming manners that one could not help 
being attracted by them. Rumours of their ap- 
proaching marriages with the Crown Prince of 
Servia and the future heir to the Roumanian 
throne were afloat at the time, and added to the 
interest which they excited. Alas, alas, all these 
hopes were to prove fallacious, and St. Petersburg 
society, which had been so much attracted by these 
two Princesses, was never to see them again, at 
least as the daughters of a reigning Sovereign, 

Dark rumours were already coursing at the time 
concerning the Empress and her affection for the 
terrible Rasputin who was to do her so much harm. 
In general she was unfortunate in her friendships, 
because the one which she formed for Madame 
Wyroubieva caused also much scandal. The Czar- 
ina with all her cleverness (and she was clever) 
had no judgment and did not possess the slightest 
knowledge of the world or of humanity. She be- 
lieved all that she was told, and, if the truth be 
said, she was so anxious to please and to be liked 
that she accepted with joy and an amazing ere- 



The First Revolution 183 

dulity the protestations of affection she met with. 
If she had only had a really good friend, so many 
of the mistakes which she made might have been 
avoided. 

One of the people who did her the most harm was 
her own sister, the Grand Duchess Elizabeth. The 
latter was an ambitious person who conceived the 
plan to rule Russia through the Empress. She 
had entered a convent not at all out of any vocation 
for the religious life, but because she thought that 
it would give her prestige in the country, and that 
she might acquire there a position which it would 
have been impossible for her to obtain as the widow 
of a Grand Duke who had been murdered on ac- 
count of his unpopularity and the hatred with which 
he was looked upon in the whole of Russia. She 
posed as a victim and she absolutely abused the 
privileges which this attitude conferred upon her. 
She used to worry the Czarina greatly, and when- 
ever the latter objected to anything that she told 
her, or refused to comply with any of the continual 
requests she put forth, she threatened her with the 
punishment of Heaven, and told her that God 
would chastise her and take away from her her 
idolised son. She spent her time going about from 



184 My Empress 

one convent to another, and in that way contrived 
to travel all over Russia and to win for herself a 
considerable number of adherents everywhere. 
Her plan was to force the Czar to rescind the Con- 
stitution which he had granted to his subjects and 
to return to the old forms of autocracy. It was she 
who had recommended Mr. Protopopoff and Mr. 
Sturmer to the Emperor, and she had managed to 
secure for herself, as well as for all the people who 
had sworn their allegiance to her, a prominent 
place in the administration of the State. 

The Empress feared her and knew beforehand 
that she would in the long run be compelled to do 
whatever her sister required of her. Sometimes, 
however, she showed some impatience at the man- 
ner in which the latter "bossed" her, to use a vul- 
gar expression, and then she would sulk and lock 
herself up in her room, refusing to see any one, 
upon which Elizabeth would sigh and make dis- 
creet allusions to the sad mental condition of the 
unfortunate Czarina. She certainly was the one 
who contributed the most to the popular belief that 
the Consort of Nicholas II. was not quite right in 
her mind. 

The only person who would fight the Grand 



The First Revolution 185 

Duchess, and not give in to her caprices, was Mad- 
ame Wyi'oubieva, and perhaps this was one of the 
reasons why Alexandra Feodorovna grew so fond 
of her. The poor Empress wanted some one to 
fight her battles for her and felt grateful to any 
person capable of doing so. She had encountered 
so few willing to do it. 

The Emperor Nicholas was very fond of his sis- 
ter-in-law. She represented to him what he called 
the only real Russian element in the Imperial fam- 
ily, in the sense that he thought her so infeodated 
to the old Muscovite traditions which his uncles and 
cousins, and even his own brother and sisters, had 
renounced, and he fancied she would be better able 
than any one else to understand the wants as well as 
the idiosyncrasies of the Russian nation. He al- 
ways listened to her with deference, and, bigoted 
as he was himself, felt ready to believe her when 
she assured him that the Almighty would always 
protect him, provided he kept faithful to the prin- 
ciples of that Orthodox Church which required from 
him the destruction of everything and every one 
that showed any antagonism to this autocracy of 
which he was the chosen representative. The 
Czar belonged to that class of people who only 



i86 My Empress 

listen to those who agree with them, and he had 
never learned anything, or profited by the lessons 
that one had tried to teach to him, no matter in 
what direction. He was a tyrant by character and 
by temper, whilst weak and irresolute, and this is 
a combination which is more often to be found than 
one would imagine. 

At the time I am talking about my mistress was 
very unhappy. For one thing, she had very little 
hope left of the recovery of her son, and apart 
from the exaggerated love which she bore him, she 
felt that the difficulty of her own position would in- 
crease should the boy die. She had an almost mor- 
bid wish to hear people assure her that such a mis- 
fortune was not going to overtake her, and she 
eagerly caught at the assurances which Rasputin 
used to give her that so long as he remained at her 
side no harm could happen to little Alexis. She 
sincerely thought that this common peasant, by 
reason of his ignorance, would be better able than 
a more cultured person to come into touch with 
the Almighty, founding her belief on the words 
of the Gospel, that He "revealed himself to simple 
and ignorant people." The fact was that she had 
grown tired of all the false protestations with which 



The First Revolution 187 

her ears were saturated, and she thought that per- 
haps a humble Russian mougik would at least show 
himself faithful to her as well as to her dynasty. 
How terrible was her mistake the future was to 
prove. 



CHAPTER XVI 
THE CZARINA'S FRIENDS 

Alexandra Feodorovna did not make any real 
friends during the first years that followed upon 
her marriage. Indeed it was only after the Japa- 
nese war that she started the intimacies for which she 
was so much reproached by her subjects. The most 
notorious was that for Rasputin, but there were two 
others just as nefarious — ^that with Madame 
Wyroubieva and with the Princess Dondoukoff. 

The latter was a lady of considerable intelligence 
and a physician of no mean skill whom the Em- 
press had put at the head of the private hospital 
she had organised at Czarskoi Selo long before the 
war broke out. Later on when other lazarets and 
ambulances, the number of which increased every 
day as the terrific struggle went on, were organised 
in the Imperial residence, the Princess Dondou- 
kofi* was appointed general superintendent of all 
these establishments, and it was she who coached 
the Czarina as weU as her daughters in the duties 

188 




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Grand Duchess Elizabeth 



1 



The Czarina's Friends 189 

of a Red Cross nurse. She was of a pushing tem- 
perament, had the reputation of being loose 
in her morals, though personally I saw nothing that 
could have justified it, and was also gifted with a 
remarkable propensity for intrigue. No one liked 
her, but everybody feared her. She insinuated her- 
self thoroughly into the confidence of the Empress, 
who referred to her in everything, and willingly 
listened to her. She was of course among the fol- 
lowers of Rasputin, and with him and Madame 
Wyroubieva formed a trio which it would have been 
difficult not only for the general public but also 
for the immediate attendants of the Russian Sov- 
ereign to fight against. 

The Princess Dondoukoif used to give drugs to 
Alexandra Feodorovna which the latter used to 
take unknown to her medical attendants and which 
were declared by them, when they discovered the 
fact, to have had a good deal to do with her shat- 
tered nerves. This may or may not have been true, 
— I shall not venture an opinion upon the subject, 
— but certainly my mistress was far too fond of the 
Princess, and would have done better to have seen 
less of her, if only from the point of view that 
the weight which she laid on her opinions consider- 



190 My Empress 

ably incensed the doctors who were in regular at- 
tendance upon her, who objected to the manner in 
which their own prescriptions were neglected. 

The Princess introduced at Court a quack medi- 
cal man from Thibet called BachmanoiF, who, she 
pretended, had brought with him from his country 
all kinds of secret remedies which she advised the 
Czarina to try on the little Grand Duke Alexis. 
The fond mother believed her, and Bachmanoff 
became one of her favourites. It is impossible to 
say whether he would have cured the child, because 
the latter's nurse, a sailor called Derewenko, of 
whom he was inordinately fond, and whom I have 
already had occasion to mention, threw out of the 
windows all the powders and potions which Alex- 
andra Feodorovna asked him to give to her son, and 
took great care the boy should not get anything but 
what his own doctor had ordered him to take. Ulti- 
mately the Grand Duke got better and stronger, 
and last year he might have been pronounced cured, 
at least in so far as the chronic ailment from which 
he was suffering could be cured. But the Empress 
in her joy at this unexpected recovery was per- 
suaded that it had taken place, thanks to the Thi- 
betan, in whom she believed more than ever. 



The Czarina's Friends 191 

The friendship for Madame Wyroubieva was 
perhaps even worse than the attachment of the 
foolish Sovereign to the Princess Dondoukoff. 
Madame Wyroubieva was the daughter not of the 
Emperor's private secretary, as she represented 
herself to be, but of a State Secretary (which is 
quite a different thing, being a purely honorific po- 
sition) called Tanieieff. She had been married to 
a navy officer with whom she could not agree, and 
they were divorced, not because he had grown mad, 
as she declared (divorce for insanity is not allowed 
in Russia) , but because he had found reason to ob- 
ject to her conduct. The Empress, for reasons no 
one ever understood, took her part and invited her 
once or twice to the Palace of Czarskoi Selo. Ma- 
dame Wyroubieva made the most of her opportu- 
nities and soon became quite indispensable to Alex- 
andra Feodorovna. She it was who, with the 
Grand Duchess Elizabeth, introduced Rasputin in- 
to the Imperial household, and with him she estab- 
lished such control of the Czarina's actions that 
soon the latter became simply a tool in their hands. 

Madame Wyroubieva was, above everything else, 
a grabbing woman. She fully meant to make a 
fortune out of the position of trust she was sup- 



192 My Empress 

posed to occupy. Both she and Rasputin were in 
their turn in the hands of a gang of adventurers 
who used them for their own ends, and they set up 
a shameful exploitation of the public exchequer for 
which unfortunately the Empress was made re- 
sponsible. The latter only looked upon Rasputin 
as a saintly personage, a kind of orthodox yogi 
whose prayers were sure to be taken into account 
by the Almighty. Terrible things have been hinted 
at in regard to her relations with him, but all that 
I can say is that to my knowledge, at least, she was 
never alone with him for one single moment, and 
that except in regard to the health of the heir to 
the throne, my mistress never spoke with him of 
anything else but religious subjects. The public 
said that he was all powerful at Court, but I feel 
convinced that these rumours arose from certain 
unscrupulous persons who had an interest in 
spreading them because they managed (thanks to 
the intimacy of which they boasted with a person- 
age who, as they related, could turn and twist the 
sovereigns at his will and pleasure) to obtain army 
contracts and other things they desired. Among 
them were ProtopopoiF and Sturmer, and the no- 
torious Manassevitsch Maniuloff , whose blackmail- 



The Czarina's Friends 193 

ing propensities caused him to be arrested and sen- 
tenced to several years' hard labour from which he 
was released by order of the present Russian gov- 
ernment. Rasputin in reality was treated in the 
Palace as a kind of jester who was allowed to do 
as he wished — a sort of fool, after the pattern of 
Chicot in Dumas' novels, and neither Nicholas II., 
who liked him even better than did the Empress, 
nor the latter ever thought of him as of anything 
else than a holy pilgrim (for that was what he pro- 
claimed himself to be) whose vocation was to go 
about preaching the gospel to the world. One 
must not forget that there have been many such in 
Russia, and that the natural tendency to mysticism, 
which is one of the characteristics of the Russian 
character, has always welcomed them with effusion. 
The Empress, who, though a German, was more 
superstitious than any Russian, fully believed that 
the presence of Rasputin at her side was a shield 
against all possible dangers. She therefore refused 
to be parted from him, and whenever anything 
happened of a nature to cause her worry she used 
to send for him, when he would prostrate himself 
on the ground and invoke the powers of Heaven 
to deliver him and his friends from evil. He was 



«^*- 



194 My Empress 

a thorough fanatic, or at least professed to affect 
the ways of a fanatic, and he used to force the Em- 
press to prostrate herself before holy images be- 
side him, and to remain with her face pressed to 
the floor for hours in earnest supplication to a God 
whom, he averred, he was the only one to honour 
as he ought to be honoured. It is difficult to real- 
ise that an Empress of Russia, and one of the 
haughty temperament of Alexandra Feodorovna, 
could lend herself to such ridiculous practices, but 
so it was, and I can only say what I have seen 
without attempting to explain it. But it was not 
surprising that when the Imperial family came 
to hear of all this, it should have been indignant 
and tried to oust from the Palace a man whose 
presence in it tended to discredit royalty at a time 
when, on the contrary, every possible means should 
have been resorted to in order to raise its prestige. 
The Empress Dowager, when she heard all that 
was going on, raised her voice, and, disliking 
though she did to meddle in what she considered did 
not concern her, she made representations to the 
Czar when the latter paid her a visit in Kieff, 
whither she had transferred her residence. Nicho- 
las listened to her, but did nothing. Others fol- 



The Czarina's Friends 195 

lowed the example of Marie Feodorovna, and the 
Grand Dukes individually and collectively tried to 
open the eyes of the head of their dynasty to the 
evils caused by the presence of Rasputin. Every- 
thing proved useless, because the Emperor just as 
much as his wife was under the spell of the clever 
comedian whose strong will had completely mas- 
tered his own weak intellect. I have often wit- 
nessed the prayer meetings which were organised 
in the Czarina's private oratory, at which Rasputin 
presidea. Few people were admitted to them, and 
the congregation generally consisted of Madame 
Wyroubieva, the Princess Dondoukoff, the Czar 
and his Consort. The Imperial children were some- 
times told to attend them but not often. Rasputin 
used to pray aloud, and then preach, touching in 
his sermons on subjects of every kind that had 
not the remotest claim to be considered religious. 
And then he assured his audience that the Lord 
had revealed himself to him and ordered him to ac- 
quaint the Czar with such and such a thing, choos- 
ing the one he had at heart at that particular mo- 
ment. The Empress generally went into hysterics 
whilst listening to him, and it was on that account 
I was asked to remain in the vicinity of the room, 



196 My Empress 

so as to be able to come to her help. I had often to 
unlace her or else she would have choked, and for 
this purpose I took her into another apartment. 
The fact that one or other of her maids saw me 
carrying away some part of her clothes gave rise 
to the most malicious rumours. The most curious 
thing about it all was that the Emperor looked on 
unmoved whilst his wife was almost writhing in 
strong convulsions and extended no help whatever 
to her, because Rasputin assured him that these 
convulsions were a manifestation of the good spir- 
its, and a proof that the prayers of the Czarina had 
been accepted by the Almighty. 

I know that all this sounds incredible and yet it 
is but the truth. The unfortunate woman whom 
the world has slandered in the most cruel manner 
possible was after all nothing but a miserable being 
whose mental balance was unstrung, to say the 
least. It would have been more sensible to have 
put her in an asylum than to have accused her of 
immoral practices of which she was incapable. Of 
course others who were witnesses of the daily ac- 
tions of Alexandra Feodorovna in Czarskoi Selo 
could not be expected to look at things with the 
same eyes as I did and I do not feel any surprise at 



The Czarina's Friends 197 

the disgust which filled all the good and devoted 
servants of the dynasty when they heard about 
these mysterious meetings during which the Holy 
Ghost was supposed to descend in person on the 
heads of Nicholas II. and his wife. There were 
some still in existence, among others the Princess 
WassiltschikoiF, one of the most prominent women 
in St. Petersburg society, who took it upon herself 
to write to my mistress to warn her of the manner 
in which she was discrediting herself and the dy- 
nasty. The Czarina was terribly offended on re- 
ceiving this letter, and fell into one of her rare fits 
of passion. She complained to the Emperor, and 
the author of this epistle that had aroused her an- 
ger was forthwith ordered to leave St. Petersburg 
and to retire in disgrace to one of her estates in the 
country. Alexandra Feodorovna clenched her 
teeth and could hardly restrain her tears when 
speaking about what she called "this infamous let- 
ter." At that moment of rage I believe she could 
have killed the lady who had thus ventured to tell 
her things which she considered the most insolent 
she had ever heard in her whole life. She was des- 
tined to feel still more offended a few days later 
when the Grand Duke Nicholas Michaylovitsch, 



198 , ' My Empress 

a cousin of the Czar, presented to the latter a 
memorandum in which he adjured him not to lis- 
ten any longer to the advice he received from his 
wife, and to dismiss the gang of adventurers whose 
presence at his side was discrediting him. He also 
was repaid by being sent into exile for the audacity 
with which he had dared to criticise the conduct of 
Alexandra Feodorovna. 

There is, therefore, nothing surprising if those 
who had come to look upon Rasputin as upon a na- 
tional danger should at last have made up their 
minds to remove him by fair means or foul. Of 
course what lay behind his assassination was the de- 
sire to put an end to the influence of the Empress 
over her Consort, and to pave the way towards her 
internment in a private asylum or in a convent 
where it was felt that she would be happier than any- 
where else. So long as Rasputin existed such a thing 
was not to be thought of, but it was secretly hoped 
that if he were finally put out of the way the mind 
of the Czarina would snap altogether and it would 
then become a relatively easy matter to persuade 
Nicholas II. to separate himself from her, when it 
was hoped that the dynasty would recover some of 
the prestige which it had lost. This, so far as I 



The Czarina's Friends 199 

know, is the real key to the murder of the adven- 
turer whose career constitutes a unique episode 
even in the annals of Russian history that has re- 
corded so many queer things. In describing it I 
have anticipated events, and must now return a few 
years back and speak of the outbreak of the great 
war, even if superficially, because its declaration 
sounded the knell of the Romanoff dynasty and, 
in a certain way, sealed the fate of the illustrious 
lady at whose side I spent so many years before 
misfortune overwhelmed her. 



CHAPTER XVII 

THE GREAT WAR 

It is useless to repeat that when the great war 
broke out no one in Russia expected it, the Czar 
least of aU. I shall not touch upon the serious part 
of this awful drama; I only mention it in so far as 
it has to do with the unhappy Empress. She was 
quite overpowered by it, and thought it the cul- 
minating point of her misfortunes. Apart from 
her apprehensions for that Russia whose Sovereign 
she was, she felt deeply the fact that she was going 
to be at war with her own kith and kin, and with 
her beloved brother of whom she was so fond. No 
one doubted among her surroundings that France 
and Russia united together would surely and 
quickly beat the Germans, but the Czarina knew 
very well that whatever the outcome of the strug- 
gle she would become one of its principal victims. 
She was perfectly aware that the nation which dis^ 
liked her so intensely called her the "German" 
quite openly, and that she would probably be sus- 

200 



The Great War 201 

pected of favouring the land of her birth in pref- 
erence to that of her adoption; she chafed before- 
hand at the injustice of the accusation. Every- 
body noticed her intense emotion on the day which 
followed the declaration of hostilities, when, dur- 
ing the religious ceremony which took place in the 
Winter Palace, she stood beside the Czar, and lis- 
tened to the reading of the manifesto announcing 
to the nation that Germany had challenged it to 
mortal combat. Before she left Peterhof (where 
the Court was spending the summer) for St. 
Petersburg, I ventured to express to her my hope 
that she would have sufficient strength to bear the 
fatigue and emotions of the trying day. "I can 
bear anything now," she replied. "Since I did not 
die yesterday, it seems to me that nothing will ever 
kill me." Momentous words which I was to re- 
member more than once as time went on and one 
disaster followed upon another. 

When the war broke out the Empress Dowager 
was in England. She telegraphed to her daughv. 
ter-in-law to take her place at the head of the Red 
Cross until her return to Russia, and to take the 
first measures necessary to ensure its activity. The 
Czarina was but too willing to do so, but she en- 



202 My Empress 

countered unusual opposition and even hostility on 
the part of the oflScials interested in the society, who 
criticised all the improvements which she suggested, 
and even refused to follow the instructions which 
she gave them. This, of course, was a source of 
bitter mortification to her, and she was but too glad 
to retire altogether from the management of the 
whole affair as soon as her mother-in-law returned. 
But this was wrongly interpreted by the public 
that said the Sovereign was not interested in the 
cause of the wounded, because she disapproved al- 
together of the war, and would have liked to see 
Russia come to an agreement with Germany. 

The position of my unfortunate mistress grew 
more and more difficult as time went on. At first 
the triumphant (for so it was called) march of the 
Russian troops into Galicia and the capture of 
Lemberg seemed to point to a successful campaign, 
but then came the first reverses, followed by the 
great retreat which meant abandoning to the enemy 
some of the most fertile provinces of the Russian 
Empire and the whole of Poland. The loss of the 
whole line of fortresses which defended the Vistula 
was also an awful blow dealt both to Russia's might 
and to Russia's welfare as well as prestige. Of 



The Great War 203 

course the whole countiy waxed indignant at this 
unexpected series of disasters, and of course the 
government was made responsible for them. 

The want of foresight on the part of the War 
Office was attributed to the general corruption 
which existed in all Russian administrative 
spheres, and also to the partiahty of the Czar for 
certain favourites, against whom he would never 
listen to any criticisms and whom he continued to 
employ though the whole country had recognised 
their utter incapacity. 

The Empress knew all these things : she had even 
been asked more than once to interfere and to 
bring them to the notice of the Czar, but she had 
always refused to meddle in questions which she 
felt were so important that any false step might 
be accompanied by terrible consequences. Once 
during one of the flying visits which the Com- 
mander in Chief, the Grand Duke Nicholas, paid 
to St. Petersburg from the front, he had tried to 
enlist her sympathies in favour of a vast plan of 
reform he wanted to bring through, but she was so 
mistrustful of him that she had thought it better 
to do nothing but to declare to him that she did not 
think herself competent to offer advice in viewof the 



204 My Empress 

general difficulties presented by the situation. She 
felt frightened at the persistence with which cer- 
tain people who were not over well disposed in her 
favour wanted to get her mixed up in matters 
where the smallest blunder might bring upon her 
head the wrath of the whole nation. But at the 
same time she attempted to do what she had never 
tried before, that is, to discuss with her husband 
the events of the day and give him the benefit of 
her opinions, which, though always moderate, were 
distinctly in favour of the continuance of the auto- 
cratic system. She once told me that she thought 
it would be far more advantageous to the nation if 
the Duma were permanently prorogued, at least 
for as long as hostilities lasted, because she feared 
for one thing that its criticisms would destroy the 
faith of the nation in its government, and for an- 
other, that it would prevent by the discussions it 
would be sure to raise the conclusion of a peace fa- 
vourable to Russian interests. This peace the 
Czarina called for with all her heart, and she would 
have sacrificed much to see it concluded. This got 
to be known, the more so that she never even tried 
to hide it, and the rumour arose that she was nego- 
tiating the conditions of such a peace with her Ger- 



The Great War 205 

man relations. This I do not believe for one mo- 
ment she had ever done or wanted to do, but those 
intent on her destruction naturally accused her of 
intriguing in a sense favourable to German inter- 
ests. She had unfortunately antagonised every 
single party in the country, the aristocracy to be- 
gin with, and also the extreme radicals and social- 
ists who made her responsible for all the measures 
of repression which the government had begun to 
take against them. The poor woman had become 
the scapegoat of all the sins of Israel. 

Nevertheless she fought bravely against these 
terrible odds, and she applied herself to give to the 
Czar some of the energy which he lacked, and of 
which perhaps she possessed too much. It was 
then that she paid different visits to the Front, a 
thing which she had never been allowed to do whilst 
the Grand Duke Nicholas was commander in chief, 
and she tried to cheer up her husband, and to en- 
courage him in the new responsibilities which he 
had assumed when he had dismissed his uncle and 
taken upon himself the functions of Commander in 
Chief of the Army. He had been forced into his 
decision by the general wish of the public, who were 
dissatisfied with the Grand Duke Nicholas, and 



2o6 My Empress 

hoped that the presence of the Sovereign at the 
head of his troops would infuse courage into the 
hearts of the latter and induce them to make every 
effort against the foe. But the troops were not to 
blame for the reverses which had overtaken them; 
the lack of ammunitions was the cause of the evil, 
and this could not be remedied by any commander 
in chief, but would have required a thorough and 
radical reform in the whole administration of the 
War Office. 

There existed no one in Russia powerful enough 
to enforce this reform. In the circumstances in 
which the country found itself placed, it would have 
required the energy and the iron will of a Peter the 
Great to overcome the obstacles standing in the 
way of any reforms of a sweeping nature, and Rus- 
sia had for sovereign Nicholas II., the weakest that 
had ever carried the sceptre of the Romanoffs. 

During these anxious days the Empress took to 
confiding in me and sometimes called me to her 
side, generally during the night when she could not 
sleep and was haunted by all kinds of fears in re- 
gard to the future. She told me then that she felt 
persuaded a revolution would follow upon the war, 
and that this time it would be a serious one which 



The Great War 207 

would require considerable energy before it would 
be suppressed. The idea that it might eventually 
prove successful never entered her mind, and I have 
often wondered at her utter blindness in this mat- 
ter. But she felt so convinced that the greater 
part of Russia was still attached to the principles 
embodied in an all-powerful autocracy that no one 
was taken more unawares than herself by the 
promptitude with which the Russian nation ac- 
cepted the overthrow of the dynasty. And yet she 
had been told often enough that this dynasty was 
in danger if it did not decide to make concession to 
public opinion that clamoured for a change. She 
still nursed illusions, and she honestly believed that 
her personal efforts in favour of wounded and dis- 
abled soldiers had made her popular with the army, 
that it felt grateful to her and to the Czar, and that 
it would not allow them to be harmed. She liked 
to relate anecdotes tending to prove this, and when- 
ever she returned to Czarskoi Selo from one of the 
frequent visits she made to the Front, after the 
Emperor had assumed the supreme command, she 
liked to call me to her side and relate to me all that 
she had seen whilst there, and how the wounded 
whom she had visited had thanked her for her kind- 



2o8 My Empress 

ness towards them, not knowing that then" thanks 
had been uttered in obedience of a command and 
had never proceeded from the heart of those who 
had uttered them. There had come, however, one 
fatal day when, instead of the cheers to which she 
had been used, the Empress was received with a 
dead silence by the troops when she accompanied 
her husband to a review of regiments about to be 
sent to the fighting Front. This was the first 
time that such a thing had happened to her, and 
the poor Czarina was so upset by this proof that 
she had lost the affection of her soldiers that she 
declared she would no longer show herself among 
them. Of course her friends tried to cheer her up, 
and to explain to her that this had been a pure ac- 
cident, but the impression had been produced, and 
its eifects were to be lasting ones. The first two 
years of the war dragged on, and sometimes I won- 
dered whether my beloved mistress would ever live 
to see the end of this awful conflict. She was getting 
weaker and weaker and her nerves were so entirely 
destroyed that all those who still cared for her were 
getting quite alarmed on her account. The Emperor 
alone seemed quite unconcerned and failed to notice 
the great change that had come over his wife. He 



The Great War 209 

imagined that she was anxious about the war, but 
did not dream that her health was getting worse 
every day and that she had lost the energy she had 
been endowed with before, in the hopeless struggle 
she was fighting against forces which were bound 
to overcome her in the long run. All her former 
vivacity had left her. She had become sweeter 
than she had ever been, even during her first years 
of married life, and she accepted with gratitude 
every small service one rendered her. The 
haughty pride with which she had in former times 
met any unpleasantness that occurred to her had 
disappeared. She had become resigned to every- 
thing that might befall her, but her great anxiety 
was for her husband and children, especially the 
former, against whom she dreaded an attempt at 
assassination whenever he was at the Front. Dur- 
ing the sleepless nights which had become her por- 
tion she fancied all kinds of evils, and then she 
would proceed to the telephone which put her in 
direct communication with headquarters and speak 
with the aide-de-camp on duty, asking for news of 
the Emperor. I do not think that she ever ob- 
tained more than an hour or two of repose in the 
twenty-four, and sometimes, when considering this, 



210 My Empress 

I did not, as I had previously, blame the Princess 
Dondoukoff for administering to her opiates des- 
tined to give her some rest. All this constituted a 
terrible state of things, but still it was nothing in 
comparison with what was to follow, and the un- 
fortunate Czarina was soon to drink to the very 
dregs the cup of sorrow that had been destined for 
her. 



CHAPTER XVIII 

DISASTERS AND THE SECOND 
REVOLUTION 

The last days of the year 1916 were sad ones 
for my poor Empress. First came the assassina- 
tion of Rasputin, which was a terrible source of 
grief for her, because she firmly believed that so 
long as he was at her side no harm could befall her, 
and certainly as events turned out she had not 
been so far wrong in her superstitious fears. Dur- 
ing the first days which followed upon the murder 
of her favourite she would sit motionless for hours 
in her boudoir, doing nothing, absorbed in thoughts 
which must have been most painful. Christmas — 
the last to be passed by the Imperial family in 
their beloved Czarskoi Selo — was a sad one, and 
the Czarina did not even attempt to shake off the 
melancholy forebodings with which she was trou- 
bled. She was preoccupied with the idea of aveng- 
ing the destruction of the man whose existence 
she had considered in the light of a fetich. It 

211 



212 My Empress 

is a well-known fact that she caused the young 
Grand Duke Dmitry to be exiled in Persia, as a 
punishment for his share in the conspiracy that had 
deprived her of her favourite. She who had al- 
ways been so kind turned cruel and merciless, and 
I once heard her exclaim that henceforward she 
would no longer listen to her heart, but follow only 
the dictates of her reason. 

There was one man who had obtained her fa- 
vour on account of the ardour with which he had 
espoused all her views ; this was the Minister of the 
Interior, Mr. Protopopoff . He had been one of 
the most intimate friends of Rasputin, and he was 
continually urging upon the Czarina the necessity 
of being firm, and of refusing mercy to those who 
had shown themselves so entirely merciless in re- 
gard to a man who had been a holy creature. Alex- 
andra Feodorovna found some consolation in her 
grief by talking it over with Protopopoif , who final- 
ly won her adhesion to the plans which he had 
formed to establish once more in Russia an abso- 
lute government. 

Christmas had come and gone and a New Year 
had begun. The difficulties of the military and 
economical condition of the country had increased 



Disasters and Second Revolution 213 

to an alarming degree. We did not perceive it at 
Czarskoi Selo, but in Petrograd, as St. Petersburg 
now was called, everybody was complaining of the 
high cost of living and the impossibility of procur- 
ing for oneself the indispensable necessities of ex- 
istence. The population was getting impatient, 
and dissatisfaction was spreading. Those who 
could see the signs of the approaching storm tried 
to persuade the Czar that he had better remain in 
the vicinity of the capital, and not go to the Front 
where, after all, his presence was not absolutely 
needed. But Nicholas II. would not listen, per- 
haps because both his wife and Mr. Protopopoff 
persuaded him that there existed no reason for 
alarm. The Empress had implicit confidence in 
the Minister and was convinced that a small display 
of energy on the part of the government would 
very quickly do away with the impatience of the 
population. She wished to get her husband out of 
the way, not at all, as has been said, because she 
wanted to make a coup d'etat, but because she did 
not wish the Czar to be worried by his family, who 
were making frantic efforts to get the Grand Duke 
Dmitry recalled from exile. At first her inten- 
tion had been to accompany Nicholas II. to head- 



214 My Empress 

quarters, but then her children had fallen ill with 
what had been considered at first an attack of in- 
fluenza, but subsequently turned out to be measles, 
and she would not leave them. The Emperor de- 
parted, promising to return inmiediately if any se- 
rious trouble occurred, and keeping meanwhile in 
close touch with his wife and the commander of the 
garrison of Czarskoi Selo. During his absence 
the Revolution took place, brought about by a re- 
volt of the troops entrusted with the defence of 
Petrograd. They went over to the Duma as soon 
as they heard that it had taken upon itself to insti- 
tute a new government. 

The Czar had been surrounded by traitors, there- 
fore he had not even been apprised of all that was 
taking place in Petrograd. Two urgent tele- 
grams which were despatched to him by the Presi- 
dent of the Duma, Mr. Rodzianko, never reached 
him, as we heard later on. Had he received them 
it is likely he would have hastened back, and per- 
haps his presence in the capital might have averted 
the catastrophe. But his attendants were mostly 
won over to the cause of the Revolution and pur- 
posely left him in ignorance of the gravity of the 
events which were taking place, until it was too late. 



Disasters and Second Revolution 215 

The Empress also was not informed of the extent 
of the revolt, and it was through an indiscretion of 
one of her servants that she got at last an inkling 
of the truth. She sent for Count BenckendorfF, 
the head of the household, and asked him to get her 
all the information possible concerning the extent 
of the rebellion. The Count, who throughout this 
sad story behaved with the greatest loyalty to the 
cause of the sovereigns whose confidence he had 
won by his long and faithful services, tried to go 
to Petrograd, where he hoped to learn some de- 
tails as to what had taken place during the two pre- 
ceding days, but found it impossible because the 
railway line was already in the hands of the revo- 
lutionaries, and no train from Czarskoi Selo was 
allowed to proceed. He had perforce to content 
himself with the news which he could obtain by 
telephone, and soon this means of communicating 
with the people likely to keep him informed as to 
what was going on was stopped. 

The Empress, almost mad with anxiety, walked 
to and fro in her apartments, wringing her hands, 
and saying the whole time that she knew the Czar 
had been killed and the news was being kept from 
her. It was with the greatest difficulty that she 



2i6 My Empress 

could be prevailed upon to send a telegram to Gen- 
eral Roussky, who was then supposed to be loyal, 
enquiring after the Emperor. In about two hours 
she received a reply saying that Nicholas II. was 
on his way to Pskoff and expected to arrive there 
that same night. 

This somewhat allayed the anxieties of the Em- 
press, and just about then the condition of the 
Grand Duchess Olga, who had taken the measles 
in a more serious form than her sisters, became sud- 
denly worse, and she was thought to be in danger, 
as pneumonia had declared itself and complicated 
her condition. And then Alexis, who had been re- 
moved to another wing of the palace in the hopes 
that he might escape the contagion, sickened in his 
turn, so that the unfortunate Czarina had another 
anxiety to fight, which after aU was perhaps the 
best thing that could have happened to her, be- 
cause the necessity of attending to her children pre- 
vented her from brooding on what was happening 
to her husband, which otherwise she would have 
done the whole of the time. 

The next thing we heard was that the Duma had 
sent two delegates to confer with the Czar; we 
hoped that from this conference something good 



Disasters and Second Revolution 217 

might result, and that Nicholas II. would be 
induced to call together a responsible ministry. 
The Empress herself was persuaded he would do 
so, and remarked that if Prince Lvoff accepted 
the position of Premier, things would not be so bad, 
because at heart he was a loyal monarchist and 
would not lend himself to any aggression against 
the person of his Sovereign. She seemed more 
cheerful than she had been for the last two or three 
days, and showed herself pleased that it was Mr. 
GutchkofF, whom she knew personally and had 
always liked, who had been despatched to Pskoff . 
"Perhaps, after all, we shall weather this storm," 
she remarked, and she further observed that in the 
grave circumstances which resulted from the un- 
favourable course the war had taken, it was per- 
haps just as well if the sole responsibility for what 
was to follow did not rest upon the Sovereign 
alone. Neither she nor any of us had the faint- 
est idea of what was actually taking place at 
Pskoff. About midnight I left the Empress. She 
had been persuaded to retire to bed, the Princess 
Dondoukoff having promised to watch by the chil- 
dren and to call her at once should any change take 
place in their condition. She was thoroughly ex- 



2i8 My Empress 

hausted and we were all glad to see her at last take 
some rest. I had lain down also in a room adjoin- 
ing the bedchamber of my mistress when at about 
three o'clock in the morning I was awakened by a 
soft knock at my door. Thinking that one of the 
children was worse, I got up instantly and went to 
hear what had happened before disturbing the Em- 
press. Standing on the threshold I found the 
Czarina's old groom of the chamber with a pale and 
frightened countenance. He pulled me aside and 
in a terrified voice exclaimed: "Something dread- 
ful has happened: the Emperor has abdicated!" 

"What?" I exclaimed, not believing my ears, 
and inclined to think that the man had gone mad. 

"The Emperor has abdicated," he repeated, and 
forthwith began to sob. 

I dropped down in a chair, and thought that the 
end of the world had come, and so indeed it had — 
of a certain world at least. 

"Who told you?" I enquired. "How did you come 
to hear it?" 

The man replied that the new ministry had ad- 
vised the commander of the town of Czarskoi Selo 
by telephone that the Czar had abdicated in favour 



Disasters and Second Revolution 219 

of his brother, and that the troops had to be ad- 
vised of the fact immediately. 

"How shall we tell the Empress?" was my first 
thought. 

Of course neither my informer nor myself could 
undertake the painful task of apprising her of the 
new misfortune which had overtaken her. We de- 
cided that the only thing to do was to inform Count 
Benckendorff and to ask him to perform the sad 
mission. But as we were proceeding to his apart- 
ments we met him coming to those of the Empress. 
He had also been informed of what had taken 
place at Pskoff a few hours before, and he was 
about to communicate them to my unfortunate 
mistress. I went back and aroused her. She was 
not sleeping, and got up immediately. She had 
been bracing herself all the time for some new 
calamity, and when told that Count Benckendorff 
wished to speak with her had felt convinced that 
he wanted to apprise her that her husband had been 
murdered. In comparison with such a catas- 
trophe, the loss of her throne seemed a small thing, 
and perhaps her first feeling was one of relief at 
finding that her apprehensions had been ground- 
less. But what she could not bring herself to un- 



220 My Empress 

derstand was the fact that it had not been in fa- 
vour of his son that the Czar had abdicated. 
"There must be a mistake. It is impossible that 
Niky has sacrificed our boy's claims!" she kept re- 
peating. But when at last compelled to believe 
that such had been the case, she gave vent to an ex- 
pression of rage which showed how thoroughly she 
despised the weak-minded man to whom she was 
bound, and exclaimed: "He might at least in his 
fright have remembered his son!" 

I think that these words are the most cruel con- 
demnation that the cowardice of Nicholas II. ever 
obtained, and deserved. 

As may be imagined, there was no sleep for any 
of us after this. When dawn appeared at last it 
found the Empress entirely dressed, already calm 
and resigned, kneeling before the sacred icons in 
her oratory, and invoking the protection of God 
for her children. Then she went up to her daugh- 
ters' room and acquainted the two younger ones, 
who had not yet been attacked by measles, of the 
change which had taken place in their destinies. 
The girls were stunned, as may easily be imagined, 
and Anastasia, the youngest, began to cry. The 




International Film Service 



Grand Duchess Anastasia 



Disasters and Second Revolution 221 

Empress watched her tears and then in a hard voice 
remarked, "It is too early to cry yet; keep your 
sorrow for another occasion," and she went out of 
the room without adding another word. 

But though she was told that her son's condition 
was serious, she did not approach his sick-bed that 
whole day. It seemed as if she could not bring 
herself to look upon the child whose advent into 
the world had been such a source of joy to her, and 
who had been despoiled of the great heritage to 
which he had been born. It was evident to all 
those who knew her well that some time would 
have to elapse before she could bring herself to for- 
give her husband for the injury he had done their 
only son, and perhaps she would never have for- 
given it had it not been for all the other misfortunes 
which were to follow upon this hasty abdication. 



CHAPTER XIX 

HOW THE CZARINA WAS ARRESTED 

A FEW dreadful days followed upon the one 
which had brought us the news of the abdication of 
the Czar. The Empress tried to get into com- 
munciation with him, but though she contrived to 
speak with him over the wire, it was from the first 
evident that every word was listened to, and she 
gave up any attempt at confidential conversation. 
What worried her was that instead of returning to 
Czarskoi Selo, Nicholas II. had elected to go to 
Mohilew. My mistress, who had had absolute con- 
fidence in General Roussky, did not trust General 
Alexieiefi^, whom she considered as quite capable of 
betraying the Czar out of ambition. Events 
proved that she had not been wrong in her appre- 
ciation as to the General, and what she did not 
know, but was to learn much later, was that he had 
practically made it impossible for the Emperor to 
return to Czarskoi Selo, and almost compelled him 
to go to Headquarters, where he intended to keep 

222 



How Czarina Was Arrested 223 

him until the Provisional Government at Petro- 
grad had made up its mind whether it ought or 
ought not to arrest the former Sovereign. We all of 
us remained in utter ignorance of what was happen- 
ing at the Front, or in Petrograd itself. The 
Czarina on the evening of the day following the ab- 
dication, when it had become already known that 
the Grand Duke Michael had refused to accept the 
throne relinquished to him by his brother, and when 
no one knew what was going to happen further, the 
Czarina called me to her room, and asked me to 
try to go to Petrograd and find out what people 
there were thinking about the whole situation. She 
gave orders for a carriage to be put at my dis- 
posal, as the railway trains did not run regularly, 
but I declined it, thinking that it would only at- 
tract attention and invite the rebels to stop me if 
any among them met me. I repaired alone and on 
foot to the railway station, where I boarded the 
first train that was leaving for the capital. No 
one noticed me, and I made my way undisturbed 
to the house of a friend, who, I knew, was likely to 
be well informed as to what was going on. Great 
was my siu*prise to find that she did not care at all 
to receive me, and almost ordered me out of her 



224 My Empress 

apartment, saying that it was as much as her life 
was worth to talk with a personal attendant of the 
Empress. She absolutely refused to answer any 
of my questions, and I had perforce to beat a hasty 
retreat. Other people whom I sought did exactly 
the same thing, and I found all my acquaintances 
echoing the general opinion which, I discovered, 
was prevalent in the capital, that it was the Czarina 
who, by her betrayal of Russia to the Germans, had 
been the cause of a Revolution which all the sane 
and reasonable members of society were deploring. 
The one subject of lamentation was the want of 
character, as they called it, of the Grand Duke 
Michael, who, according to the general opinion, 
ought not to have played into the hands of the 
Revolutionaries and refused his brother's succes- 
sion. At that time the idea of a Republic, which 
now has become a familiar one, had not yet taken 
hold of the public mind, and people were only de- 
sirous of seeing established a constitutional mon- 
archy. What made me quite aghast was to find 
that the rumour had been spread that this refusal 
of the Grand Duke was due to an intrigue of the 
Empress, who had, so it was related to me, caused 
to be conveyed to him a message to the effect that 



How Czarina Was Arrested 225 

should he dare to accept the throne she would put 
herself at the head of a movement against him. The 
very thought that my poor mistress could have 
done such a thing was ridiculous, hut in times of 
crisis like the one we were going through, the wild- 
est tales are believed, and in the case of Alexandra 
Feodorovna it was but too easy to make Petrograd 
accept the idea that she was planning to bring for- 
ward the rights of her son, even against the desire 
of her husband. As I proceeded along the Nevsky 
Prospect I met sandwich men carrying large plac- 
ards with seditious inscriptions concerning the 
Czarina, and on one of them her immediate impris- 
onment, trial for high treason and execution were 
put forward and claimed. Cries of "Down with 
Alexandra Feodorovna!" were heard everywhere, 
and my heart sank within me at the thought that 
perhaps my beloved mistress would fall a victim to 
the fury of the mob. The remembrance of the 
French Revolution and of Marie Antoinette, to 
whom the Empress was so fond of comparing her- 
self, came back to me, and without waiting for fur- 
ther news (which I did not know where to obtain, 
because no one in Petrograd seemed to know any- 
thing) I made my way back to Czarskoi Selo, and 



226 My Empress 

before presenting myself to the Czarina, I sought 
Count Benckendorff, to whom I related my expe- 
riences in the capital. The Count listened to me, 
and looked very grave when I mentioned to him 
the exasperation, for it could hardly be called 
otherwise, of the rough elements of the population 
of Petrograd against Alexandra Feodorovna. 
We discussed for a few minutes the possibility of 
removing her from the Palace to some other place 
where she would be in comparative safety, but gave 
up the idea as impracticable, because, for one thing, 
the Empress would never have consented to aban- 
don her sick children, and then, there was already 
such a close watch established around the Palace 
of Czarskoi Selo and its inmates, that it would have 
been next to impossible for any one to get out with- 
out the fact being at once reported to the Revolu- 
tionary Government. Besides, it was necessary to 
learn what the Emperor himself meant to do, and 
what were his plans for the future. The situation 
was therefore extremely serious, but all that one 
could do in the present circumstances was to wait. 
The Count enquired of me the names of the serv- 
ants among the personal attendants of the Czarina 
whom I thought quite trustworthy, and I men- 



How Czarina Was Arrested 227 

tioned a few. He considered it necessary to es- 
tablish a kind of secret guard around her for fear 
that an assassin might find his way to her apart- 
ments, and indeed for three days and nights he re- 
mained himself outside her door, not caring to trust 
her safety to any one else. If ever there^was one 
faithful man in the world it was Count Bencken- 
dorff. 

When, after my conversation with him, I en- 
tered the presence of my mistress I found her in 
a violent state of agitation. The news had reached 
her that the Empress Dowager had gone to Mo- 
hilev to see her son, and Alexandra Feodorovna 
felt persuaded that the journey had been under- 
taken for the purpose of persuading Nicholas II. 
to separate himself from his wife. It was quite 
useless to point out to the distressed Princess that 
such a thing would not have had any motive at the 
present time, when the Czar had resigned the 
throne. She would not listen to me, but cried and 
sobbed, declaring that nothing in the world would 
ever part her from her children and that she would 
rather kill herself than give them up. She could 
not understand how it was that her husband, of 
whose affection she had felt so sure, had not al- 



228 My Empress 

ready returned to her, especially in view of the fact 
that all her children were so dangerously ill. The 
idea that Nicholas was no longer a free agent, or 
able to do what he liked, had not occurred to her, 
and when I pointed out to her that such might be 
the case, she would not listen to me, exclaiming, 
"Who could dare to stop him? After all, he is al- 
ways the Czar." The magnitude of the catas- 
trophe which had just taken place she had not yet 
appreciated. 

But the same night rumours that the Revolution- 
ary Government had decided to arrest the former 
Sovereign reached Czarskoi Selo. None among 
us would credit them in the beginning, so utterly 
impossible did the whole thing seem. But Count 
Benckendorff, who perhaps had at his disposal 
sources of information others did not possess, told 
us that unfortunately the news was but too true 
and that delegates had been sent to Mohilev with 
instructions to take captive Nicholas II. What 
they meant to do with him he could not tell, and 
for the matter of that no one knew. The question 
arose as to how the Empress was to be made ac- 
quainted with this new misfortune, and it had not 
yet been decided by the Count, who wished to wait 



How Czarina Was Arrested 229 

for an official confirmation of the rumour, when he 
was called to the telephone and told that the new 
commander of the military district of Petrograd, 
General Komiloff, wanted to speak with him. 

The General told Count Benckendorff that he 
had been commissioned by the new government to 
deliver a certain message to the Empress, whom he 
affected to call Alexandra Feodorovna, and that 
he wished to see her immediately about it. To the 
reply that Her Majesty was sitting beside the bed 
of her sick children and could not be disturbed, 
Korniloff* declared that it was imperative he should 
execute his commission, and that unless the Em- 
press complied with his request he should use force 
to obtain admittance. 

There remained nothing to do but to ask him to 
wait for a few minutes until the Czarina had been 
communicated with. Count Benckendorff re- 
paired to her apartments, and communicated to her 
the curt request of the Commander in Chief. She 
said at once that she would be ready for him in half 
an hour, and declared that she was sure he had some 
bad news for her concerning the Emperor. 

"Perhaps they have killed him!" she exclauned, 



230 My Empress 

"and then they will kill me, and what will become 
of these poor children?" 

Korniloff arrived at the Palace accompanied by 
all of the officers of his staff. He was escorted 
also by an infantry battalion, which he caused to be 
stationed in the big square in front of the Palace. 
Received by Count Benckendorff, he was con- 
ducted to the large drawing-room in which the Em- 
press used to give her audiences in the days gone 
by, and in a few minutes the Sovereign entered the 
apartment, dressed all in black, with no other orna- 
ments but one row of pearls round her neck. She 
bowed stiffly and, having sat down, motioned to the 
General to do the same, asking him at the same 
time to what she was indebted for the honour of his 
visit. There was a ring of irony in her voice which, 
as I was told afterwards, struck all the listeners 
painfully and must have offended the General. He 
rose and in rude accents said: "I must request 
you. Madam, to stand up, and to listen with at- 
tention to the commands I am about to impose 
upon you." 

Alexandra Feodorovna raised her eyes in mute 
surprise, but without protesting rose up from her 
seat, a thing which, by the way, I never understood 



How Czarina Was Arrested 231 

how she could have done. Korniloff' then pro- 
ceeded to read to her an order signed by all the 
ministers, which declared that she was to consider 
herself under arrest, that she was forbidden to re- 
ceive or to send any letters without the permission 
of the officer in charge of the Palace of Czarskoi 
Selo, that she was not to walk out alone in the park 
or grounds, and that she was to consider herself 
obliged to execute any further orders that might 
be given to her. He announced to her at the same 
time that he was about to change the guard at the 
Palace and that she would be strictly watched. 

A dead silence reigned in the room after these 
words of the old soldier. Count BenckendorfF, 
who was present, felt as if the earth had opened un- 
der his feet, but he deemed it inadvisable to say 
anything. The Empress simply bowed her head, 
then asked Korniloff not to remove her children's 
attendants until they were recovered from their ill- 
ness, and especially to allow the sailor who for 
years had taken care of little Alexis to remain with 
him. The General said that he had no objection 
to this ; then she simply turned her back upon him 
and without saying anything further left the room. 
Korniloff then gave his instructions to Count 



232 My Empress 

Benckendorff, who, when he was left alone with 
him, entreated not to be dismissed, declaring 
that he meant to share the fate of his masters in 
any case. The Commander made him then re- 
sponsible for all the interior arrangements of the 
Palace, and advised him that for the future he 
should have to apply to the State Treasury and not 
to the administration of the former Sovereign's pri- 
vate fortune for the money necessary for current 
expenses, and he requested him to be as economical 
as possible in the matter of these expenses. 

The Empress, as if dazed, went to her bedroom. 
There I was waiting for her. One look at her face 
was sufficient to make me realise that something 
absolutely dreadful had taken place. Alexandra 
Feodorovna threw herself face downwards on a 
sofa placed at the foot of her bed, and exclaimed 
between the most heartrending sobs: "We are 
lost, we are lost I What will become now of these 
unfortunate children; what will become of them?" 
And for a long time she sobbed on, and would not 
be comforted by anything that I could say. 

News of the arrest of the unfortunate Sovereign 
spread like lightning through the whole Palace, 
and, as if she had been stricken with the plague. 



How Czarina Was Arrested 233 

nearly all her attendants left her in the space of a 
few hours. Out of her six maids, only one re- 
mained "true to her salt," as they say in the East, 
and even the women who had waited on the Grand 
Duchesses hastened to pack their things and to run 
away, in spite of the fact that the young Princesses 
were known to be desperately ill. The Princess 
Dondoukoff was removed by order of Korniloff, 
and for two days the sick children were attended 
only by their mother and myself. The Empress 
was experiencing in the most cruel way imaginable 
the ingratitude of mankind. If Count Bencken- 
dorfF had not had his own cook prepare her meals, 
she would have been exposed to death from hunger 
amidst all the splendours of her magnificent Pal- 
ace. At last the Count had to apply to the Revo- 
lutionary Government, and servants were sent to 
replace those who had abandoned us, and to ensure 
the regular service of the prisoners. All through 
these dreadful days none of us knew what had hap- 
pened to the Czar, and this incertitude was, as can 
easily be imagined, adding to the misery and anguish 
of his wife. At last Count Benckendorff received a 
wire from Prince Dolgoroukoff (not Dolgorouky, 
as the foreign papers have printed; they are two 



234 My Empress 

distinct families), one of the attendants of Nich- 
olas II., that the deposed Sovereign was being 
brought back to Czarskoi Selo, where the Revolu- 
tionary Government had decided he was for the 
present to be interned. 

The news was immediately communicated to the 
Empress and proved a consolation to her in her 
sorrows. We all of us, the few who were left of 
the splendid retinue of servants of former days, 
wondered how our master would look, and braced 
ourselves for the painful task of receiving him, a 
prisoner of state, in the Palace where he had ruled 
as an all-powerful autocrat. It was on a dark and 
dreary March morning that he returned to us. 
Strict orders had been given to the soldiers com- 
posing the guard in charge of the Palace gates not 
to treat him otherwise than they would a colonel, 
(he had persisted all through his reign in wearing 
a Colonel's epaulettes), because he was hencefor- 
ward to be known as plain Nicholas Alexandrovitsch 
Romanoff, and though we had been apprised of 
the fact, yet we were not prepared for what was to 
follow, and we were horrified to see, from the win- 
dow at which we watched, the officer on duty give 
orders to salute Prince Dolgoroukojff, who sat be- 



How Czarina Was Arrested 235 

side the Emperor in the automobile that brought 
them home, with the honours due to his rank as gen- 
eral, whilst the deposed Sovereign was treated as 
his inferior. The meaning of the Revolution had 
never been made so plain to us as by this significant 
incident. 

At the top of the staircase of the Palace, Count 
BenckendorfF, dressed in full uniform, was await- 
ing Nicholas II., whom he received with the same 
ceremonial as in the time when he was still on the 
throne. The noble-hearted gentleman showed in 
those days of adversity of what stuff he was made, 
and did all that lay within the limits of his power 
to atone for the neglect and ingratitude of others. 

The Emperor hardly greeted him. He rushed 
up the stairs, taking two steps at a time, towards 
the apartments of the Empress. Alexandra Feo- 
dorovna was standing on the threshold, pale and 
lovely, with a hectic bloom on her cheeks which re- 
minded one of the glory of her past beauty and 
youth. Neither husband nor wife could speak as 
they fell into each other's arms. 



CHAPTER XX 

LIFE IN PRISON 

It was only on the first day which followed upon 
the return of Nicholas II. at Czarskoi Selo that he 
was allowed to see his wife without witnesses. The 
very next morning Korniloff again appeared at the 
Palace and delivered the following instructions to 
the gaolers (one can hardly call them otherwise) 
who were to watch over the deposed monarch and 
his family: 

I. The Emperor was not to he allowed to com- 
municate with his Consort, except during meal- 
times, when of course conversation could touch 
only upon indifferent subjects. When he wanted 
to visit his children, with whom he was allowed to 
remain as long as he liked, the Empress was to 
leave the room immediately he had entered it. 

II. Neither the Sovereign nor his Consort were 
allowed to walk out alone and unattended in the 
park and grounds, but were always to be escorted 

236 



Life in Prison 237 

by a non-commissioned officer and three soldiers 
with armed rifles. 

III. When they went to church they were to 
be brought to the private chapel of the Palace by 
the same escort, and not permitted to converse with 
each other. 

IV. Every time one of their attendants had to 
see them he or she had to be thoroughly searched 
by the officer on duty and a woman specially ap- 
pointed for the purpose. 

The young Grand Duchesses, when they had re- 
covered, were not put under the severe control to 
which their parents were subjected; they could stay 
with their parents, and especially with the Emperor, 
as much and as long as they liked. Olga made 
use of this permission more than her sisters, and 
she used to spend hours with her father, to whom 
she was particularly attached. But at the same 
time a strict though not so apparent watch was 
kept over their actions, and they were not per- 
mitted to leave the Palace grounds for the town 
of Czarskoi Selo, not even to visit the nimierous 
hospitals where they had hitherto worked as sis- 
ters of charity. 

None of the numerous members of the Imperial 



238 My Empress 

family, who were nearly all in Petrograd, mani- 
fested a desire to see the chief of their race; on the 
contrary, in many cases they went over to the cause 
of the Revolution, as, for instance, the Grand Duke 
Cyrill, who was the first to lead the troops of which 
he had the command to the Duma, to swear al- 
legiance to the new government. But several 
members of the former household of the unfortu- 
nate sovereigns came to put themselves at their 
disposal, among others old Madame Narischkine, 
the Mistress of the Robes of the Empress, who, 
though she had never been liked by the latter, re- 
mained faithful to her to the end, and even peti- 
tioned to be allowed to go to Siberia with her, a re- 
quest which was refused her by the government. 

The Czar accepted all these irksome regulations 
with complete indifference. He used to take long 
walks with Count Benckendorff and Prince Dol- 
goroukoff , with whom he chatted the whole of the 
time with the most complete unconcern. He did 
not seem to mind in the very least the presence of 
the men deputed to escort him during these walks, 
but on the contrary made it a point to thank them 
when they had brought him home, and to exchange 
a few words with them. He used to read the 



Life in Prison 239 

papers very regularly, and seemed always anxious 
to learn what was going on at the Front. The 
Empress, on the contrary, refused absolutely to 
submit to the irritating restrictions imposed upon 
her, and during the whole time that she was kept 
at Czarskoi Selo never once went out of the Pal- 
ace, not caring to take her walks under the watch- 
ful eyes of an escort. She treated everybody with 
complete disdain. When the Czar entered the 
room where she generally sat with her children, she 
made him a deep and respectful curtsey, and im- 
mediately quitted the apartment, before the officer 
on duty had an opportunity to request her to do so. 
She had never got over the fact of Korniloff having 
ordered her to stand up whilst he had read to her 
the orders of the new government, and more than 
once in her conversations with me had referred 
to this cruel humiliation, repeating, "Can you 
imagine ! He made me stand up, me, the Empress 
of Russia," and she did not care to incur a similar 
humiliation a second time. Though she was re- 
peatedly told that her health required her to be 
in the open air, especially when spring arrived, 
she would not listen to any remonstrances on the 
subject, but kept strictly indoors, snatching only 



240 My Empress 

breaths of fresh air from her window which she 
used to keep wide open, and beside which she sat 
working at garments and bandages for soldiers, 
which she asked me to forward to the Red Cross. 
She never opened a book or glanced at a paper, and 
except needlework her only occupations consisted 
in going to church and giving lessons to her young- 
est children. She refused every kind of sympathy 
and remained silent and forlorn in her misery until 
the day when she was told that she was about to 
exchange her present prison for another, far worse 
in every respect. 

A few days after the one which had seen her con- 
fined in captivity a commission sent by the Govern- 
ment had arrived at Czarskoi Selo to ask the Em- 
press to deliver to its keeping the crown jewels, as 
well as her private ones. She had consented to re- 
ceive the members of this commission and told them 
that so far as the crown jewels were concerned 
they had never been in her charge and could be 
found in the Winter Palace; but her own diamonds 
and pearls belonged to her personally and she was 
not going to give them up unless compelled by 
force to do so, when she would solemnly protest 
against an act which she considered in the light of 



Life in Prison 241 

a robbery pure and simple. Her attitude was so 
firm that the commissioners withdrew without hav- 
ing achieved their mission, and afterwards Keren- 
sky, to whom the matter was referred, gave up the 
point and allowed my mistress to retain posses- 
sion of the ornaments she had clung to with such 
determination and energy. 

But the silver which adorned the Imperial din- 
ing table was all seized by the Government, under 
the pretext that it was State property, until even- 
tually Nicholas II. found himself without one fork 
or knife with which to eat. At last Count Bencken- 
dorff made an arrangement wherewith part of this 
confiscated silver was bought back by him and the 
money handed over to the treasury. But as the 
private fortune of the Czar had been confiscated, 
it was the young Grand Duchesses, Olga and 
Tatiana, who out of their own funds redeemed 
these things. 

In general it became extremely difficult to meet 
the expenses of the Imperial household, because 
the government refused to supply the means to do 
so, and the treasury grumbled at every request 
made by Count Benckendorff for funds. Every 
day saw something disappear of the former luxury 



242 My Empress 

which had presided at the daily existence of the 
Czar and of his family, until at last life at Czarskoi 
Selo became almost ascetic in its simplicity. Meals 
consisted only of three courses, and the favourite, 
Zakuska, or relishes with which every Russian din- 
ner or lunch begins, were suppressed. Wine dis- 
appeared altogether from the table, and several 
automobiles were sold, whilst the chauffeurs were 
dismissed. I even had to beg the Empress not to 
use as much linen as she had been in the habit of 
doing formerly, because we lacked the means to 
wash it, and these were but small miseries among 
the more important ones which assailed us. 

Among the many annoyances and indignities put 
upon the Emperor and Empress was the order 
given by the Revolutionary Government not to ad- 
dress them any more as Your Majesty, but to call 
them Colonel and Mrs. Romanoff. The Czar took 
it good-humouredly, or, rather, contemptuously, 
but the Empress was extremely affected by this in- 
solence. "We have been crowned in Moscow," she 
used to say, "and nothing can change this now. 
The Czar is always the Czar. No one can rob him 
of this dignity, even if he has renounced it of his 
own accord." 



Life in Prison 243 

Of course when we were alone with her we ad- 
dressed her in the old style. Beginning with 
Count BenckendorfF, and ending with the last of 
the few servants who had voluntarily elected to re- 
main in the service of the former sovereigns, we 
were very careful not to make them feel more than 
could he helped the change that had taken place in 
their destinies. But when one of the officers on 
guard was present it was more difficult, because he 
used to reprove us quite aloud if we ventured to 
speak with our master and mistress in the old re- 
spectful way to which we had been used. The gov- 
ernment was so particular in the matter of the title 
allowed to Nicholas II., that all the newspapers 
which were addressed to him bore the superscrip- 
tion of "Colonel Nicholas Alexandrovitsch Ro- 
manoff." And on the letters which the Empress 
received, the appellation of "Her Majesty the Em- 
press" was scratched out, and replaced by "Alex- 
andra Feodorovna Romanoff." It was the repe- 
tition of what had taken place with Louis XVI. 
when he was designated by the name of Capet by 
his gaolers, and, strange as it may appear, it was 
among all her misfortunes the one which, out- 



244 My Empress 

wardly at least, seemed most to affect the unhappy 
Empress. 

Of com*se correspondence was a forbidden thing 
for all of us. Letters were strictly censored and 
even the smallest parcel brought to the Palace was 
examined two or three times before being handed 
over to the person to whom it belonged. Books 
were equally the object of suspicion, and at last the 
Empress and Emperor gave orders that new ones 
were no longer to be forwarded to them, as had been 
done previously. 

Of course all these vexatious measures depended 
a good deal on the personality of the officer in 
charge of the interior arrangements and guard of 
the Palace. If he were a humane man things 
would not be so bad, but if he happened to belong 
to the ranks of the rabid republicans or anarchists 
there was not an obstacle that he did not put in our 
way or an unpleasantness that he spared us. I re- 
member one of the latter who, one morning when 
I was expecting a parcel containing a new blouse 
from the Empress's dressmaker, absolutely refused 
to let it pass until I had unpicked the lining to 
prove to him that no letter or message had been 
concealed between it and the stuff itself. It was 



Life in Prison 245 

the young Grand Duchesses who were most to be 
pitied among the prisoners of Czarskoi Selo. The 
girls were the sweetest things imaginable, and their 
beautiful characters came out in a splendid light 
during that trying time when, at an age where girls 
generally know only the sunny side of life, they 
had to become acquainted and to be actors in one 
of the greatest tragedies history has ever had to 
chronicle. And yet they realised perhaps even 
better than did their father and mother, the full ex- 
tent of the drama which was being played around 
them. Olga, in particular, seemed to have a fore- 
warning that it was only beginning and that it 
might end in blood just as it had begun in tears. 
She was a clever, thoughtful woman, with a con- 
siderable amount of common sense, and sometimes 
she used to confide to me her apprehensions in re- 
gard to the future. "If the Germans get near to 
Petrograd, or if a new revolution breaks out there," 
she often said, "we shall be its first victims, and 
either the mob or the Government will put us to 
death." 

Tatiana was not so resigned as her sister. She 
revolted against the terrible injustice of which she 
was the victim, and she could not understand how 



246 My Empress 

after all the care she had taken of wounded soldiers 
and miserable refugees whom her committee had 
helped, her good intentions had been misunder- 
stood, and how she could have been put aside at a 
moment's notice and deprived of the possibility of 
going on further with the work to which she had 
given all her energy, and with which she had been 
so successful. She had an impetuous nature, more 
like her mother's than like the placid temperament 
of her father, and she would have liked to be able 
to express aloud the contempt which she felt for 
all those whose victim and prisoner she was. The 
two youngest daughters of the Czar and Czarina 
were still too much in the schoolroom to be able to 
do aught else but be astonished at the change which 
had taken place in their existence. They looked 
at all that was occurring with big, surprised eyes, 
and were more ready to weep than to attempt to 
fight against a fate which had proved too strong 
for them. They clung to their mother more than 
did Olga or Tatiana, and hardly left her protec- 
tion. The Empress, who had never been a fond 
mother in the sense of caresses, had changed in that 
respect since the misfortunes that had fallen upon 
her, and she now hugged her girls and drew them 



Life in Prison 247 

to her breast with a passionate earnestness which 
made the children exclaim that now they were hap- 
pier than they had ever been before, because their 
mother embraced them just as much as if they had 
been poor little waifs, with a mamma ignorant of 
what etiquette meant. The remark had something 
touching about it, and I think that the Empress 
realised this as well as did others, because she 
showed herself more affectionate towards her 
daughters than she had been used to do, and was 
no longer absorbed by her exclusive tenderness for 
her son. She seemed indeed to have lost her in- 
terest in the latter since the day she had realised 
that he was no longer the heir to one of the greatest 
thrones in the world. 

The child himself understood it, and he was per- 
haps the one who suffered most from the conse- 
quences of the change which had transformed him 
into an ordinary little boy, after he had been the 
most important personage in his family. He fretted 
over this change, and I fancy that at times he felt 
resentful against his father and mother for having 
so easily acquiesced in their own degradation. He 
would have liked to see his father make a stand 
against the Revolution, and at least refuse to sur- 



248 My Empress 

render the rights of his son and heir. One day he 
betrayed something of his feelings when he told 
Count Benckendorff that if he had not been ill but 
with the Czar at Headquarters, as he generally was, 
he would never have allowed him to abdicate. The 
Count did not reply, but I imagine that he regret- 
ted such had not been the case. Indeed to this day 
it is incomprehensible to me how Nicholas II. could 
have been induced to sacrifice the rights of his son, 
and not to have insisted on the latter being pro- 
claimed Emperor in his stead. 

In the meantime the days dragged on, and we 
were all wondering whither all this was to lead. 
The feeling that a change of some kind was bound 
to take place floated in the air, but no one could 
guess of what nature this change was to be. At 
times the fear would seize us that the Government 
would remove the Czar and his Consort to the for- 
tress, which would have meant that they would be 
tried, and perhaps condemned to terrible penalties 
for their imaginary crimes, but hard as we all tried 
to penetrate the secret of the future, we did not suc- 
ceed in doing so, and when this future was revealed 
to us, it surpassed in horror all that we had ever 
imagined or dreaded. 



CHAPTER XXI 

EXILE— I AM DISMISSED 

TowAEDS the middle of the summer vague ru- 
mours reached us that in consequence of the agita- 
tion which was already shaking the country to a 
considerable degree, the Government had decided 
to remove Nicholas II. to another and safer resi- 
dence than Czarskoi Selo. It was feared that if 
an insurrectionary movement took place at Petro- 
grad, the mob might proceed to the Imperial Bor- 
ough and murder the former Czar. At least this 
was the pretext put forward by the ministers, to ex- 
plain the reasons which had induced them to put 
out of the way the unfortunate Emperor and his 
family. Of course no one believed them, because 
it would have been relatively easy to have controlled 
the populace in case it had tried to attack the Pal- 
ace where the prisoners were confined. And if 
this had been thought impossible, surely there were 
other places than Siberia where they could have 
been sent. 

249 



250 My Empress 

I am not here, however, to blame or to excuse 
anybody. I wish merely to relate facts such as I 
have known them, and nothing else. So I shall pro- 
ceed with my story, which is now drawing to an end. 

It was in the course of a July afternoon that we 
were summoned before the military commander of 
Czarskoi Selo. By we I mean the household, or 
what was left of it, of the deposed sovereigns. We 
were informed that the latter were about to leave 
their present residence and that only a few persons 
would be allowed to accompany them. I was told 
that I would not be permitted to do so, as my pres- 
ence was not considered necessary to the Empress, 
who, it was ironically remarked, would not require 
any longer two maids, especially one who like my- 
self had purely academic functions. I pleaded 
hard to be exempted from this ordeal of being re- 
moved with others from the service of the gracious 
lady at whose side and in whose service I had re- 
mained twenty-five years, but my request and pro- 
testations were not taken into account. I was told 
to prepare myself to leave the Palace at a moment's 
notice and to have both my own things and those 
belonging to the Empress packed and ready to be 
taken away. 



Exile — I am Dismissed 251 

Count Benckendorff and Prince DolgoroukofF, 
who declared that nothing but sheer force would 
part them from their former Sovereign, and two 
ladies in waiting on the Empress, the Princess 
Obolensky, and Mademoiselle von Butzov, who 
was specially attached to the service of the young 
Grand Duchesses, were allowed to travel with the 
prisoners, as well as some servants who had found 
favour in the eyes of the Government probably be- 
cause they had consented to take upon themselves 
the duty of spying upon their master and mistress. 
But the suite was to be very limited, and to the last 
minute we were left in ignorance as to the real des- 
tination of Nicholas II. Count Benckendorff was 
the only exception to this measure and he was 
sworn to secrecy. 

When I returned to the Palace, I could not help 
seeking the Empress and relating to her all that I 
had heard. She raised her hands to Heaven with 
the exclamation, "They will put us in the fortress, 
and then murder us like they did Louis XVI." But 
she showed no fear, and remained as calm and com- 
posed as ever, not caring to let her children be 
troubled sooner than was necessary with the news 
of what was awaiting them in the near future. 



252 My Empress 

Three days later an officer sent by the govern- 
ment asked to see the young Grand Duchesses. He 
communicated to them the news that their parents 
were to be transported to Tobolsk in Siberia and 
that they were left entirely free to accompany 
them there or to remain at Czarskoi Selo, in which 
case they would be permitted to remain in the Pal- 
ace and to occupy their present apartments. The 
girls did not hesitate one single moment and replied 
that they would not think of abandoning their 
father and mother, but would go with them wher- 
ever it pleased the government to send them. It 
is a curious thing that no one thought for one mo- 
ment of suggesting that the little Alexis should be 
left in Europe, and the delicate child was not given 
a thought, but on the contrary despatched with 
alacrity to an exile which might easily kill him, as 
he was hardly strong enough to be able to with- 
stand the rigour of the terrible climate to which he 
was being consigned. It was only after the Grand 
Duchesses had been called upon to make their de- 
cision that the Czar and his Consort were officially 
informed that they were about to be removed to 
Tobolsk. The place is about one of the worst in 
the whole of Siberia, both as regards temperature 



Exile — I am Dismissed 253 

and resources. Half village and half town, its 
population consists of political exiles and prison- 
ers, and of Yakoutes, a savage, nomad folk, that 
spends its time in the unexplored forests which sur- 
round the town, whence they emerge from time to 
time to sell the furs which they have gathered to- 
gether in the winter. The thermometer falls be- 
low freezing point for months at a stretch, and al- 
together it is one of the dreariest spots in the whole 
world. It is to this living death and to this awful 
solitude that were to be consigned the man and the 
woman whom the world had known as the Emperor 
and Empress of All the Russias, together with 
their innocent children. The Tour du Temple, 
where Louis XVI. was confined, was not half so 
awful as this. 

And yet the Empress accepted the news if not 
with resignation at least with composure. To tell 
the truth she was weary of Czarskoi Selo, where 
everything reminded her of former and happier 
times, and perhaps she was not sorry to have at last 
a complete change of surroundings. She declared 
herself ready to start as soon as ordered to do so 
and busied herself with the preparations for her ap- 
proaching departure just as if it had been a holi- 



254 My Empress 

day excursion. The only thing which she asked for 
was to see her sister, the Grand Duchess Elizabeth, 
but though the latter was informed that she could 
if she wished proceed to Czarskoi Selo, she re- 
fused to do so, and contented herself with writing 
a very short and formal note to the Empress, who 
felt this want of heart far more than she admitted. 
These were indeed sad days that preceded the sad 
departure. None among us had the faintest hope 
of ever again seeing the kind masters we were part- 
ing from, and the prisoners themselves thought 
that they would never come back to this Russia 
that was behaving so harshly towards them. On 
the last evening the Emperor called us to his pres- 
ence and thanked us for our faithful services. He 
was pale but otherwise unmoved. The whole 
thing seemed, to judge from his appearance, to 
constitute an episode that did not concern him. 
The Empress was agitated, but also resigned, and 
she tried to put on a gaiety which she did not feel. 
She had since the Revolution always worn black 
dresses, but on that evening she ordered me to pre- 
pare her for the morrow a dark blue costume. She 
did not wish strangers to think that she wore 
mourning for her misfortunes. No one slept that 



Exile — I am Dismissed 255 

night in the Palace, and when the hour for depar- 
ture sounded there was not one dry eye amongst 
us. I obtained permission to accompany my mis- 
tress to the railway station and part of the way. 
My heart was bursting with despair. 

They started — ^that unfortunate family — with 
an air of cheerful courage, on this momentous and 
awful journey. Without a sigh the Czarina bade 
good-bye to that Palace which had seen her great- 
ness and her downfall. Probably she had, as 
Queen Elizabeth of Austria had once said, "died 
inwardly" long before that day, and nothing more 
could hurt her now. Without a tear she entered 
the train, such a shabby one when compared with 
the sumptuous cars in which she had been used to 
travel, and she did not even turn her head to look 
back on the theatre of her former splendour and 
misery. The whistle sounded, the engine began 
to move, and with it disappeared into space the 
haughty autocracy which had ruled over Russia — 
Holy Russia — since Peter the Great had organ- 
ised it as an Empire, and which though no longer 
great, yet had remained an immense thing until the 
Revolution, with the mistakes and faults of its rep- 
resentatives, had finally destroyed it. . . . 



256 My Empress 

I have nothing more to say. This is not a po- 
litical work and I have purposely avoided any men- 
tion of my personal opinions in regard to the ca- 
tastrophe which has sent my former masters into 
that Siberia which has witnessed already so many 
tragedies. Personally they have always been kind 
to me. I would be an ungrateful person if I did 
not acknowledge it, and if I forgot to shed tears 
over their fate. 



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